KING HENRY THE FOURTH

PART 2

BY

WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE

1599

King Henry the Fourth, Part 2 by William Shakespeare.

This edition was created and published by Global Grey

©GlobalGrey 2018

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CONTENTS

Dramatis Personae

Induction

ACT 1

Scene 1

Scene 2

Scene 3

ACT 2

Scene 1

Scene 2

Scene 3

Scene 4

ACT 3

Scene 1

Scene 2

ACT 4

Scene 1

Scene 2

Scene 3

Scene 4

Scene 5

ACT 5

Scene 1

Scene 2

Scene 3

Scene 4

Scene 5

Epilogue

DRAMATIS PERSONAE

RUMOUR, the Presenter.

KING HENRY the Fourth.

His sons

HENRY, PRINCE OF WALES, afterwards King Henry V.

THOMAS, DUKE OF CLARENCE.

PRINCE JOHN OF LANCASTER.

PRINCE HUMPHREY OF GLOUCESTER.

EARL OF WARWICK.

EARL OF WESTMORELAND.

EARL OF SURREY.

GOWER.

HARCOURT.

BLUNT.

Lord Chief Justice of the King's Bench.

A Servant of the Chief-Justice.

EARL OF NORTHUMBERLAND.

SCROOP, Archbishop of York.

LORD MOWBRAY.

LORD HASTINGS.

LORD BARDOLPH.

SIR JOHN COLEVILLE.

TRAVERS and MORTON, retainers of Northumberland.

SIR JOHN FALSTAFF.

His Page.

BARDOLPH.

PISTOL.

POINS.

PETO.

SHALLOW and SILENCE, country justices.

DAVY, Servant to Shallow.

MOULDY, SHADOW, WART, FEEBLE, and BULLCALF, recruits.

FANG and SNARE, sheriff's officers.

LADY NORTHUMBERLAND.

LADY PERCY.

MISTRESS QUICKLY, hostess of a tavern in Eastcheap.

DOLL TEARSHEET.

Lords and Attendants; Porter, Drawers, Beadles, Grooms, etc.

A Dancer, speaker of the epilogue.

SCENE: England.

INDUCTION

Warkworth. Before the castle

Enter RUMOUR, painted full of tongues

RUMOUR

Open your ears; for which of you will stop

The vent of hearing when loud Rumour speaks?

I, from the orient to the drooping west,

Making the wind my post-horse, still unfold

The acts commenced on this ball of earth:

Upon my tongues continual slanders ride,

The which in every language I pronounce,

Stuffing the ears of men with false reports.

I speak of peace, while covert enmity

Under the smile of safety wounds the world:

And who but Rumour, who but only I,

Make fearful musters and prepared defence,

Whiles the big year, swoln with some other grief,

Is thought with child by the stern tyrant war,

And no such matter? Rumour is a pipe

Blown by surmises, jealousies, conjectures

And of so easy and so plain a stop

That the blunt monster with uncounted heads,

The still-discordant wavering multitude,

Can play upon it. But what need I thus

My well-known body to anatomize

Among my household? Why is Rumour here?

I run before King Harry's victory;

Who in a bloody field by Shrewsbury

Hath beaten down young Hotspur and his troops,

Quenching the flame of bold rebellion

Even with the rebel's blood. But what mean I

To speak so true at first? my office is

To noise abroad that Harry Monmouth fell

Under the wrath of noble Hotspur's sword,

And that the king before the Douglas' rage

Stoop'd his anointed head as low as death.

This have I rumour'd through the peasant towns

Between that royal field of Shrewsbury

And this worm-eaten hold of ragged stone,

Where Hotspur's father, old Northumberland,

Lies crafty-sick: the posts come tiring on,

And not a man of them brings other news

Than they have learn'd of me: from Rumour's tongues

They bring smooth comforts false, worse than

true wrongs.

Exit

ACT 1

SCENE 1

The same.

Enter LORD BARDOLPH

LORD BARDOLPH

Who keeps the gate here, ho?

The Porter opens the gate

Where is the earl?

Porter

What shall I say you are?

LORD BARDOLPH

Tell thou the earl

That the Lord Bardolph doth attend him here.

Porter

His lordship is walk'd forth into the orchard;

Please it your honour, knock but at the gate,

And he himself wilt answer.

Enter NORTHUMBERLAND

LORD BARDOLPH

Here comes the earl.

Exit Porter

NORTHUMBERLAND

What news, Lord Bardolph? every minute now

Should be the father of some stratagem:

The times are wild: contention, like a horse

Full of high feeding, madly hath broke loose

And bears down all before him.

LORD BARDOLPH

Noble earl,

I bring you certain news from Shrewsbury.

NORTHUMBERLAND

Good, an God will!

LORD BARDOLPH

As good as heart can wish:

The king is almost wounded to the death;

And, in the fortune of my lord your son,

Prince Harry slain outright; and both the Blunts

Kill'd by the hand of Douglas; young Prince John

And Westmoreland and Stafford fled the field;

And Harry Monmouth's brawn, the hulk Sir John,

Is prisoner to your son: O, such a day,

So fought, so follow'd and so fairly won,

Came not till now to dignify the times,

Since Caesar's fortunes!

NORTHUMBERLAND

How is this derived?

Saw you the field? came you from Shrewsbury?

LORD BARDOLPH

I spake with one, my lord, that came from thence,

A gentleman well bred and of good name,

That freely render'd me these news for true.

NORTHUMBERLAND

Here comes my servant Travers, whom I sent

On Tuesday last to listen after news.

Enter TRAVERS

LORD BARDOLPH

My lord, I over-rode him on the way;

And he is furnish'd with no certainties

More than he haply may retail from me.

NORTHUMBERLAND

Now, Travers, what good tidings comes with you?

TRAVERS

My lord, Sir John Umfrevile turn'd me back

With joyful tidings; and, being better horsed,

Out-rode me. After him came spurring hard

A gentleman, almost forspent with speed,

That stopp'd by me to breathe his bloodied horse.

He ask'd the way to Chester; and of him

I did demand what news from Shrewsbury:

He told me that rebellion had bad luck

And that young Harry Percy's spur was cold.

With that, he gave his able horse the head,

And bending forward struck his armed heels

Against the panting sides of his poor jade

Up to the rowel-head, and starting so

He seem'd in running to devour the way,

Staying no longer question.

NORTHUMBERLAND

Ha! Again:

Said he young Harry Percy's spur was cold?

Of Hotspur Coldspur? that rebellion

Had met ill luck?

LORD BARDOLPH

My lord, I'll tell you what;

If my young lord your son have not the day,

Upon mine honour, for a silken point

I'll give my barony: never talk of it.

NORTHUMBERLAND

Why should that gentleman that rode by Travers

Give then such instances of loss?

LORD BARDOLPH

Who, he?

He was some hilding fellow that had stolen

The horse he rode on, and, upon my life,

Spoke at a venture. Look, here comes more news.

Enter MORTON

NORTHUMBERLAND

Yea, this man's brow, like to a title-leaf,

Foretells the nature of a tragic volume:

So looks the strand whereon the imperious flood

Hath left a witness'd usurpation.

Say, Morton, didst thou come from Shrewsbury?

MORTON

I ran from Shrewsbury, my noble lord;

Where hateful death put on his ugliest mask

To fright our party.

NORTHUMBERLAND

How doth my son and brother?

Thou tremblest; and the whiteness in thy cheek

Is apter than thy tongue to tell thy errand.

Even such a man, so faint, so spiritless,

So dull, so dead in look, so woe-begone,

Drew Priam's curtain in the dead of night,

And would have told him half his Troy was burnt;

But Priam found the fire ere he his tongue,

And I my Percy's death ere thou report'st it.

This thou wouldst say, 'Your son did thus and thus;

Your brother thus: so fought the noble Douglas:'

Stopping my greedy ear with their bold deeds:

But in the end, to stop my ear indeed,

Thou hast a sigh to blow away this praise,

Ending with 'Brother, son, and all are dead.'

MORTON

Douglas is living, and your brother, yet;

But, for my lord your son--

NORTHUMBERLAND

Why, he is dead.

See what a ready tongue suspicion hath!

He that but fears the thing he would not know

Hath by instinct knowledge from others' eyes

That what he fear'd is chanced. Yet speak, Morton;

Tell thou an earl his divination lies,

And I will take it as a sweet disgrace

And make thee rich for doing me such wrong.

MORTON

You are too great to be by me gainsaid:

Your spirit is too true, your fears too certain.

NORTHUMBERLAND

Yet, for all this, say not that Percy's dead.

I see a strange confession in thine eye:

Thou shakest thy head and hold'st it fear or sin

To speak a truth. If he be slain, say so;

The tongue offends not that reports his death:

And he doth sin that doth belie the dead,

Not he which says the dead is not alive.

Yet the first bringer of unwelcome news

Hath but a losing office, and his tongue

Sounds ever after as a sullen bell,

Remember'd tolling a departing friend.

LORD BARDOLPH

I cannot think, my lord, your son is dead.

MORTON

I am sorry I should force you to believe

That which I would to God I had not seen;

But these mine eyes saw him in bloody state,

Rendering faint quittance, wearied and out-breathed,

To Harry Monmouth; whose swift wrath beat down

The never-daunted Percy to the earth,

From whence with life he never more sprung up.

In few, his death, whose spirit lent a fire

Even to the dullest peasant in his camp,

Being bruited once, took fire and heat away

From the best temper'd courage in his troops;

For from his metal was his party steel'd;

Which once in him abated, all the rest

Turn'd on themselves, like dull and heavy lead:

And as the thing that's heavy in itself,

Upon enforcement flies with greatest speed,

So did our men, heavy in Hotspur's loss,

Lend to this weight such lightness with their fear

That arrows fled not swifter toward their aim

Than did our soldiers, aiming at their safety,

Fly from the field. Then was the noble Worcester

Too soon ta'en prisoner; and that furious Scot,

The bloody Douglas, whose well-labouring sword

Had three times slain the appearance of the king,

'Gan vail his stomach and did grace the shame

Of those that turn'd their backs, and in his flight,

Stumbling in fear, was took. The sum of all

Is that the king hath won, and hath sent out

A speedy power to encounter you, my lord,

Under the conduct of young Lancaster

And Westmoreland. This is the news at full.

NORTHUMBERLAND

For this I shall have time enough to mourn.

In poison there is physic; and these news,

Having been well, that would have made me sick,

Being sick, have in some measure made me well:

And as the wretch, whose fever-weaken'd joints,

Like strengthless hinges, buckle under life,

Impatient of his fit, breaks like a fire

Out of his keeper's arms, even so my limbs,

Weaken'd with grief, being now enraged with grief,

Are thrice themselves. Hence, therefore, thou nice crutch!

A scaly gauntlet now with joints of steel

Must glove this hand: and hence, thou sickly quoif!

Thou art a guard too wanton for the head

Which princes, flesh'd with conquest, aim to hit.

Now bind my brows with iron; and approach

The ragged'st hour that time and spite dare bring

To frown upon the enraged Northumberland!

Let heaven kiss earth! now let not Nature's hand

Keep the wild flood confined! let order die!

And let this world no longer be a stage

To feed contention in a lingering act;

But let one spirit of the first-born Cain

Reign in all bosoms, that, each heart being set

On bloody courses, the rude scene may end,

And darkness be the burier of the dead!

TRAVERS

This strained passion doth you wrong, my lord.

LORD BARDOLPH

Sweet earl, divorce not wisdom from your honour.

MORTON

The lives of all your loving complices

Lean on your health; the which, if you give o'er

To stormy passion, must perforce decay.

You cast the event of war, my noble lord,

And summ'd the account of chance, before you said

'Let us make head.' It was your presurmise,

That, in the dole of blows, your son might drop:

You knew he walk'd o'er perils, on an edge,

More likely to fall in than to get o'er;

You were advised his flesh was capable

Of wounds and scars and that his forward spirit

Would lift him where most trade of danger ranged:

Yet did you say 'Go forth;' and none of this,

Though strongly apprehended, could restrain

The stiff-borne action: what hath then befallen,

Or what hath this bold enterprise brought forth,

More than that being which was like to be?

LORD BARDOLPH

We all that are engaged to this loss

Knew that we ventured on such dangerous seas

That if we wrought our life 'twas ten to one;

And yet we ventured, for the gain proposed

Choked the respect of likely peril fear'd;

And since we are o'erset, venture again.

Come, we will all put forth, body and goods.

MORTON

'Tis more than time: and, my most noble lord,

I hear for certain, and do speak the truth,

The gentle Archbishop of York is up

With well-appointed powers: he is a man

Who with a double surety binds his followers.

My lord your son had only but the corpse,

But shadows and the shows of men, to fight;

For that same word, rebellion, did divide

The action of their bodies from their souls;

And they did fight with queasiness, constrain'd,

As men drink potions, that their weapons only

Seem'd on our side; but, for their spirits and souls,

This word, rebellion, it had froze them up,

As fish are in a pond. But now the bishop

Turns insurrection to religion:

Supposed sincere and holy in his thoughts,

He's followed both with body and with mind;

And doth enlarge his rising with the blood

Of fair King Richard, scraped from Pomfret stones;

Derives from heaven his quarrel and his cause;

Tells them he doth bestride a bleeding land,

Gasping for life under great Bolingbroke;

And more and less do flock to follow him.

NORTHUMBERLAND

I knew of this before; but, to speak truth,

This present grief had wiped it from my mind.

Go in with me; and counsel every man

The aptest way for safety and revenge:

Get posts and letters, and make friends with speed:

Never so few, and never yet more need.

Exeunt

SCENE 2

London. A street.

Enter FALSTAFF, with his Page bearing his sword and buckler

FALSTAFF

Sirrah, you giant, what says the doctor to my water?

Page

He said, sir, the water itself was a good healthy

water; but, for the party that owed it, he might

have more diseases than he knew for.

FALSTAFF

Men of all sorts take a pride to gird at me: the

brain of this foolish-compounded clay, man, is not

able to invent anything that tends to laughter, more

than I invent or is invented on me: I am not only

witty in myself, but the cause that wit is in other

men. I do here walk before thee like a sow that

hath overwhelmed all her litter but one. If the

prince put thee into my service for any other reason

than to set me off, why then I have no judgment.

Thou whoreson mandrake, thou art fitter to be worn

in my cap than to wait at my heels. I was never

manned with an agate till now: but I will inset you

neither in gold nor silver, but in vile apparel, and

send you back again to your master, for a jewel,--

the juvenal, the prince your master, whose chin is

not yet fledged. I will sooner have a beard grow in

the palm of my hand than he shall get one on his

cheek; and yet he will not stick to say his face is

a face-royal: God may finish it when he will, 'tis

not a hair amiss yet: he may keep it still at a

face-royal, for a barber shall never earn sixpence

out of it; and yet he'll be crowing as if he had

writ man ever since his father was a bachelor. He

may keep his own grace, but he's almost out of mine,

I can assure him. What said Master Dombledon about

the satin for my short cloak and my slops?

Page

He said, sir, you should procure him better

assurance than Bardolph: he would not take his

band and yours; he liked not the security.

FALSTAFF

Let him be damned, like the glutton! pray God his

tongue be hotter! A whoreson Achitophel! a rascally

yea-forsooth knave! to bear a gentleman in hand,

and then stand upon security! The whoreson

smooth-pates do now wear nothing but high shoes, and

bunches of keys at their girdles; and if a man is

through with them in honest taking up, then they

must stand upon security. I had as lief they would

put ratsbane in my mouth as offer to stop it with

security. I looked a' should have sent me two and

twenty yards of satin, as I am a true knight, and he

sends me security. Well, he may sleep in security;

for he hath the horn of abundance, and the lightness

of his wife shines through it: and yet cannot he

see, though he have his own lanthorn to light him.

Where's Bardolph?

Page

He's gone into Smithfield to buy your worship a horse.

FALSTAFF

I bought him in Paul's, and he'll buy me a horse in

Smithfield: an I could get me but a wife in the

stews, I were manned, horsed, and wived.

Enter the Lord Chief-Justice and Servant

Page

Sir, here comes the nobleman that committed the

Prince for striking him about Bardolph.

FALSTAFF

Wait, close; I will not see him.

Lord Chief-Justice What's he that goes there?

Servant

Falstaff, an't please your lordship.

Lord Chief-Justice He that was in question for the robbery?

Servant

He, my lord: but he hath since done good service at

Shrewsbury; and, as I hear, is now going with some

charge to the Lord John of Lancaster.

Lord Chief-Justice What, to York? Call him back again.

Servant

Sir John Falstaff!

FALSTAFF

Boy, tell him I am deaf.

Page

You must speak louder; my master is deaf.

Lord Chief-Justice I am sure he is, to the hearing of any thing good.

Go, pluck him by the elbow; I must speak with him.

Servant

Sir John!

FALSTAFF

What! a young knave, and begging! Is there not

wars? is there not employment? doth not the king

lack subjects? do not the rebels need soldiers?

Though it be a shame to be on any side but one, it

is worse shame to beg than to be on the worst side,

were it worse than the name of rebellion can tell

how to make it.

Servant

You mistake me, sir.

FALSTAFF

Why, sir, did I say you were an honest man? setting

my knighthood and my soldiership aside, I had lied

in my throat, if I had said so.

Servant

I pray you, sir, then set your knighthood and our

soldiership aside; and give me leave to tell you,

you lie in your throat, if you say I am any other

than an honest man.

FALSTAFF

I give thee leave to tell me so! I lay aside that

which grows to me! if thou gettest any leave of me,

hang me; if thou takest leave, thou wert better be

hanged. You hunt counter: hence! avaunt!

Servant

Sir, my lord would speak with you.

Lord Chief-Justice Sir John Falstaff, a word with you.

FALSTAFF

My good lord! God give your lordship good time of

day. I am glad to see your lordship abroad: I heard

say your lordship was sick: I hope your lordship

goes abroad by advice. Your lordship, though not

clean past your youth, hath yet some smack of age in

you, some relish of the saltness of time; and I must

humbly beseech your lordship to have a reverent care

of your health.

Lord Chief-Justice Sir John, I sent for you before your expedition to

Shrewsbury.

FALSTAFF

An't please your lordship, I hear his majesty is

returned with some discomfort from Wales.

Lord Chief-Justice I talk not of his majesty: you would not come when

I sent for you.

FALSTAFF

And I hear, moreover, his highness is fallen into

this same whoreson apoplexy.

Lord Chief-Justice Well, God mend him! I pray you, let me speak with

you.

FALSTAFF

This apoplexy is, as I take it, a kind of lethargy,

an't please your lordship; a kind of sleeping in the

blood, a whoreson tingling.

Lord Chief-Justice What tell you me of it? be it as it is.

FALSTAFF

It hath its original from much grief, from study and

perturbation of the brain: I have read the cause of

his effects in Galen: it is a kind of deafness.

Lord Chief-Justice I think you are fallen into the disease; for you

hear not what I say to you.

FALSTAFF

Very well, my lord, very well: rather, an't please

you, it is the disease of not listening, the malady

of not marking, that I am troubled withal.

Lord Chief-Justice To punish you by the heels would amend the

attention of your ears; and I care not if I do

become your physician.

FALSTAFF

I am as poor as Job, my lord, but not so patient:

your lordship may minister the potion of

imprisonment to me in respect of poverty; but how

should I be your patient to follow your

prescriptions, the wise may make some dram of a

scruple, or indeed a scruple itself.

Lord Chief-Justice I sent for you, when there were matters against you

for your life, to come speak with me.

FALSTAFF

As I was then advised by my learned counsel in the

laws of this land-service, I did not come.

Lord Chief-Justice Well, the truth is, Sir John, you live in great infamy.

FALSTAFF

He that buckles him in my belt cannot live in less.

Lord Chief-Justice Your means are very slender, and your waste is great.

FALSTAFF

I would it were otherwise; I would my means were

greater, and my waist slenderer.

Lord Chief-Justice You have misled the youthful prince.

FALSTAFF

The young prince hath misled me: I am the fellow

with the great belly, and he my dog.

Lord Chief-Justice Well, I am loath to gall a new-healed wound: your

day's service at Shrewsbury hath a little gilded

over your night's exploit on Gad's-hill: you may

thank the unquiet time for your quiet o'er-posting

that action.

FALSTAFF

My lord?

Lord Chief-Justice But since all is well, keep it so: wake not a

sleeping wolf.

FALSTAFF

To wake a wolf is as bad as to smell a fox.

Lord Chief-Justice What! you are as a candle, the better part burnt

out.

FALSTAFF

A wassail candle, my lord, all tallow: if I did say

of wax, my growth would approve the truth.

Lord Chief-Justice There is not a white hair on your face but should

have his effect of gravity.

FALSTAFF

His effect of gravy, gravy, gravy.

Lord Chief-Justice You follow the young prince up and down, like his

ill angel.

FALSTAFF

Not so, my lord; your ill angel is light; but I hope

he that looks upon me will take me without weighing:

and yet, in some respects, I grant, I cannot go: I

cannot tell. Virtue is of so little regard in these

costermonger times that true valour is turned

bear-herd: pregnancy is made a tapster, and hath

his quick wit wasted in giving reckonings: all the

other gifts appertinent to man, as the malice of

this age shapes them, are not worth a gooseberry.

You that are old consider not the capacities of us

that are young; you do measure the heat of our

livers with the bitterness of your galls: and we

that are in the vaward of our youth, I must confess,

are wags too.

Lord Chief-Justice Do you set down your name in the scroll of youth,

that are written down old with all the characters of

age? Have you not a moist eye? a dry hand? a

yellow cheek? a white beard? a decreasing leg? an

increasing belly? is not your voice broken? your

wind short? your chin double? your wit single? and

every part about you blasted with antiquity? and

will you yet call yourself young? Fie, fie, fie, Sir John!

FALSTAFF

My lord, I was born about three of the clock in the

afternoon, with a white head and something a round

belly. For my voice, I have lost it with halloing

and singing of anthems. To approve my youth

further, I will not: the truth is, I am only old in

judgment and understanding; and he that will caper

with me for a thousand marks, let him lend me the

money, and have at him! For the box of the ear that

the prince gave you, he gave it like a rude prince,

and you took it like a sensible lord. I have

chequed him for it, and the young lion repents;

marry, not in ashes and sackcloth, but in new silk

and old sack.

Lord Chief-Justice Well, God send the prince a better companion!

FALSTAFF

God send the companion a better prince! I cannot

rid my hands of him.

Lord Chief-Justice Well, the king hath severed you and Prince Harry: I

hear you are going with Lord John of Lancaster

against the Archbishop and the Earl of

Northumberland.

FALSTAFF

Yea; I thank your pretty sweet wit for it. But look

you pray, all you that kiss my lady Peace at home,

that our armies join not in a hot day; for, by the

Lord, I take but two shirts out with me, and I mean

not to sweat extraordinarily: if it be a hot day,

and I brandish any thing but a bottle, I would I

might never spit white again. There is not a

dangerous action can peep out his head but I am

thrust upon it: well, I cannot last ever: but it

was alway yet the trick of our English nation, if

they have a good thing, to make it too common. If

ye will needs say I am an old man, you should give

me rest. I would to God my name were not so

terrible to the enemy as it is: I were better to be

eaten to death with a rust than to be scoured to

nothing with perpetual motion.

Lord Chief-Justice Well, be honest, be honest; and God bless your

expedition!

FALSTAFF

Will your lordship lend me a thousand pound to

furnish me forth?

Lord Chief-Justice Not a penny, not a penny; you are too impatient to

bear crosses. Fare you well: commend me to my

cousin Westmoreland.

Exeunt Chief-Justice and Servant

FALSTAFF

If I do, fillip me with a three-man beetle. A man

can no more separate age and covetousness than a'

can part young limbs and lechery: but the gout

galls the one, and the pox pinches the other; and

so both the degrees prevent my curses. Boy!

Page

Sir?

FALSTAFF

What money is in my purse?

Page

Seven groats and two pence.

FALSTAFF

I can get no remedy against this consumption of the

purse: borrowing only lingers and lingers it out,

but the disease is incurable. Go bear this letter

to my Lord of Lancaster; this to the prince; this

to the Earl of Westmoreland; and this to old

Mistress Ursula, whom I have weekly sworn to marry

since I perceived the first white hair on my chin.

About it: you know where to find me.

Exit Page

A pox of this gout! or, a gout of this pox! for

the one or the other plays the rogue with my great

toe. 'Tis no matter if I do halt; I have the wars

for my colour, and my pension shall seem the more

reasonable. A good wit will make use of any thing:

I will turn diseases to commodity.

Exit

SCENE 3

York. The Archbishop's palace.

Enter the ARCHBISHOP OF YORK, the Lords HASTINGS, MOWBRAY, and BARDOLPH

ARCHBISHOP OF YORK

Thus have you heard our cause and known our means;

And, my most noble friends, I pray you all,

Speak plainly your opinions of our hopes:

And first, lord marshal, what say you to it?

MOWBRAY

I well allow the occasion of our arms;

But gladly would be better satisfied

How in our means we should advance ourselves

To look with forehead bold and big enough

Upon the power and puissance of the king.

HASTINGS

Our present musters grow upon the file

To five and twenty thousand men of choice;

And our supplies live largely in the hope

Of great Northumberland, whose bosom burns

With an incensed fire of injuries.

LORD BARDOLPH

The question then, Lord Hastings, standeth thus;

Whether our present five and twenty thousand

May hold up head without Northumberland?

HASTINGS

With him, we may.

LORD BARDOLPH

Yea, marry, there's the point:

But if without him we be thought too feeble,

My judgment is, we should not step too far

Till we had his assistance by the hand;

For in a theme so bloody-faced as this

Conjecture, expectation, and surmise

Of aids incertain should not be admitted.

ARCHBISHOP OF YORK

'Tis very true, Lord Bardolph; for indeed

It was young Hotspur's case at Shrewsbury.

LORD BARDOLPH

It was, my lord; who lined himself with hope,

Eating the air on promise of supply,

Flattering himself in project of a power

Much smaller than the smallest of his thoughts:

And so, with great imagination

Proper to madmen, led his powers to death

And winking leap'd into destruction.

HASTINGS

But, by your leave, it never yet did hurt

To lay down likelihoods and forms of hope.

LORD BARDOLPH

Yes, if this present quality of war,

Indeed the instant action: a cause on foot

Lives so in hope as in an early spring

We see the appearing buds; which to prove fruit,

Hope gives not so much warrant as despair

That frosts will bite them. When we mean to build,

We first survey the plot, then draw the model;

And when we see the figure of the house,

Then must we rate the cost of the erection;

Which if we find outweighs ability,

What do we then but draw anew the model

In fewer offices, or at last desist

To build at all? Much more, in this great work,

Which is almost to pluck a kingdom down

And set another up, should we survey

The plot of situation and the model,

Consent upon a sure foundation,

Question surveyors, know our own estate,

How able such a work to undergo,

To weigh against his opposite; or else

We fortify in paper and in figures,

Using the names of men instead of men:

Like one that draws the model of a house

Beyond his power to build it; who, half through,

Gives o'er and leaves his part-created cost

A naked subject to the weeping clouds

And waste for churlish winter's tyranny.

HASTINGS

Grant that our hopes, yet likely of fair birth,

Should be still-born, and that we now possess'd

The utmost man of expectation,

I think we are a body strong enough,

Even as we are, to equal with the king.

LORD BARDOLPH

What, is the king but five and twenty thousand?

HASTINGS

To us no more; nay, not so much, Lord Bardolph.

For his divisions, as the times do brawl,

Are in three heads: one power against the French,

And one against Glendower; perforce a third

Must take up us: so is the unfirm king

In three divided; and his coffers sound

With hollow poverty and emptiness.

ARCHBISHOP OF YORK

That he should draw his several strengths together

And come against us in full puissance,

Need not be dreaded.

HASTINGS

If he should do so,

He leaves his back unarm'd, the French and Welsh

Baying him at the heels: never fear that.

LORD BARDOLPH

Who is it like should lead his forces hither?

HASTINGS

The Duke of Lancaster and Westmoreland;

Against the Welsh, himself and Harry Monmouth:

But who is substituted 'gainst the French,

I have no certain notice.

ARCHBISHOP OF YORK

Let us on,

And publish the occasion of our arms.

The commonwealth is sick of their own choice;

Their over-greedy love hath surfeited:

An habitation giddy and unsure

Hath he that buildeth on the vulgar heart.

O thou fond many, with what loud applause

Didst thou beat heaven with blessing Bolingbroke,

Before he was what thou wouldst have him be!

And being now trimm'd in thine own desires,

Thou, beastly feeder, art so full of him,

That thou provokest thyself to cast him up.

So, so, thou common dog, didst thou disgorge

Thy glutton bosom of the royal Richard;

And now thou wouldst eat thy dead vomit up,

And howl'st to find it. What trust is in

these times?

They that, when Richard lived, would have him die,

Are now become enamour'd on his grave:

Thou, that threw'st dust upon his goodly head

When through proud London he came sighing on

After the admired heels of Bolingbroke,

Criest now 'O earth, yield us that king again,

And take thou this!' O thoughts of men accursed!

Past and to come seems best; things present worst.

MOWBRAY

Shall we go draw our numbers and set on?

HASTINGS

We are time's subjects, and time bids be gone.

Exeunt

ACT 2

SCENE 1

London. A street.

Enter MISTRESS QUICKLY, FANG and his Boy with her, and SNARE following.

MISTRESS QUICKLY

Master Fang, have you entered the action?

FANG

It is entered.

MISTRESS QUICKLY

Where's your yeoman? Is't a lusty yeoman? will a'

stand to 't?

FANG

Sirrah, where's Snare?

MISTRESS QUICKLY

O Lord, ay! good Master Snare.

SNARE

Here, here.

FANG

Snare, we must arrest Sir John Falstaff.

MISTRESS QUICKLY

Yea, good Master Snare; I have entered him and all.

SNARE

It may chance cost some of us our lives, for he will stab.

MISTRESS QUICKLY

Alas the day! take heed of him; he stabbed me in

mine own house, and that most beastly: in good

faith, he cares not what mischief he does. If his

weapon be out: he will foin like any devil; he will

spare neither man, woman, nor child.

FANG

If I can close with him, I care not for his thrust.

MISTRESS QUICKLY

No, nor I neither: I'll be at your elbow.

FANG

An I but fist him once; an a' come but within my vice,--

MISTRESS QUICKLY

I am undone by his going; I warrant you, he's an

infinitive thing upon my score. Good Master Fang,

hold him sure: good Master Snare, let him not

'scape. A' comes continuantly to Pie-corner--saving

your manhoods--to buy a saddle; and he is indited to

dinner to the Lubber's-head in Lumbert street, to

Master Smooth's the silkman: I pray ye, since my

exion is entered and my case so openly known to the

world, let him be brought in to his answer. A

hundred mark is a long one for a poor lone woman to

bear: and I have borne, and borne, and borne, and

have been fubbed off, and fubbed off, and fubbed

off, from this day to that day, that it is a shame

to be thought on. There is no honesty in such

dealing; unless a woman should be made an ass and a

beast, to bear every knave's wrong. Yonder he

comes; and that errant malmsey-nose knave, Bardolph,

with him. Do your offices, do your offices: Master

Fang and Master Snare, do me, do me, do me your offices.

Enter FALSTAFF, Page, and BARDOLPH

FALSTAFF

How now! whose mare's dead? what's the matter?

FANG

Sir John, I arrest you at the suit of Mistress Quickly.

FALSTAFF

Away, varlets! Draw, Bardolph: cut me off the

villain's head: throw the quean in the channel.

MISTRESS QUICKLY

Throw me in the channel! I'll throw thee in the

channel. Wilt thou? wilt thou? thou bastardly

rogue! Murder, murder! Ah, thou honeysuckle

villain! wilt thou kill God's officers and the

king's? Ah, thou honey-seed rogue! thou art a

honey-seed, a man-queller, and a woman-queller.

FALSTAFF

Keep them off, Bardolph.

FANG

A rescue! a rescue!

MISTRESS QUICKLY

Good people, bring a rescue or two. Thou wo't, wo't

thou? Thou wo't, wo't ta? do, do, thou rogue! do,

thou hemp-seed!

FALSTAFF

Away, you scullion! you rampallion! You

fustilarian! I'll tickle your catastrophe.

Enter the Lord Chief-Justice, and his men

Lord Chief-Justice What is the matter? keep the peace here, ho!

MISTRESS QUICKLY

Good my lord, be good to me. I beseech you, stand to me.

Lord Chief-Justice How now, Sir John! what are you brawling here?

Doth this become your place, your time and business?

You should have been well on your way to York.

Stand from him, fellow: wherefore hang'st upon him?

MISTRESS QUICKLY

O most worshipful lord, an't please your grace, I am

a poor widow of Eastcheap, and he is arrested at my suit.

Lord Chief-Justice For what sum?

MISTRESS QUICKLY

It is more than for some, my lord; it is for all,

all I have. He hath eaten me out of house and home;

he hath put all my substance into that fat belly of

his: but I will have some of it out again, or I

will ride thee o' nights like the mare.

FALSTAFF

I think I am as like to ride the mare, if I have

any vantage of ground to get up.

Lord Chief-Justice How comes this, Sir John? Fie! what man of good

temper would endure this tempest of exclamation?

Are you not ashamed to enforce a poor widow to so

rough a course to come by her own?

FALSTAFF

What is the gross sum that I owe thee?

MISTRESS QUICKLY

Marry, if thou wert an honest man, thyself and the

money too. Thou didst swear to me upon a

parcel-gilt goblet, sitting in my Dolphin-chamber,

at the round table, by a sea-coal fire, upon

Wednesday in Wheeson week, when the prince broke

thy head for liking his father to a singing-man of

Windsor, thou didst swear to me then, as I was

washing thy wound, to marry me and make me my lady

thy wife. Canst thou deny it? Did not goodwife

Keech, the butcher's wife, come in then and call me

gossip Quickly? coming in to borrow a mess of

vinegar; telling us she had a good dish of prawns;

whereby thou didst desire to eat some; whereby I

told thee they were ill for a green wound? And

didst thou not, when she was gone down stairs,

desire me to be no more so familiarity with such

poor people; saying that ere long they should call

me madam? And didst thou not kiss me and bid me

fetch thee thirty shillings? I put thee now to thy

book-oath: deny it, if thou canst.

FALSTAFF

My lord, this is a poor mad soul; and she says up

and down the town that the eldest son is like you:

she hath been in good case, and the truth is,

poverty hath distracted her. But for these foolish

officers, I beseech you I may have redress against them.

Lord Chief-Justice Sir John, Sir John, I am well acquainted with your

manner of wrenching the true cause the false way. It

is not a confident brow, nor the throng of words

that come with such more than impudent sauciness

from you, can thrust me from a level consideration:

you have, as it appears to me, practised upon the

easy-yielding spirit of this woman, and made her

serve your uses both in purse and in person.

MISTRESS QUICKLY

Yea, in truth, my lord.

Lord Chief-Justice Pray thee, peace. Pay her the debt you owe her, and

unpay the villany you have done her: the one you

may do with sterling money, and the other with

current repentance.

FALSTAFF

My lord, I will not undergo this sneap without

reply. You call honourable boldness impudent

sauciness: if a man will make courtesy and say

nothing, he is virtuous: no, my lord, my humble

duty remembered, I will not be your suitor. I say

to you, I do desire deliverance from these officers,

being upon hasty employment in the king's affairs.

Lord Chief-Justice You speak as having power to do wrong: but answer

in the effect of your reputation, and satisfy this

poor woman.

FALSTAFF

Come hither, hostess.

Enter GOWER

Lord Chief-Justice Now, Master Gower, what news?

GOWER

The king, my lord, and Harry Prince of Wales

Are near at hand: the rest the paper tells.

FALSTAFF

As I am a gentleman.

MISTRESS QUICKLY

Faith, you said so before.

FALSTAFF

As I am a gentleman. Come, no more words of it.

MISTRESS QUICKLY

By this heavenly ground I tread on, I must be fain

to pawn both my plate and the tapestry of my

dining-chambers.

FALSTAFF

Glasses, glasses is the only drinking: and for thy

walls, a pretty slight drollery, or the story of

the Prodigal, or the German hunting in water-work,

is worth a thousand of these bed-hangings and these

fly-bitten tapestries. Let it be ten pound, if thou

canst. Come, an 'twere not for thy humours, there's

not a better wench in England. Go, wash thy face,

and draw the action. Come, thou must not be in

this humour with me; dost not know me? come, come, I

know thou wast set on to this.

MISTRESS QUICKLY

Pray thee, Sir John, let it be but twenty nobles: i'

faith, I am loath to pawn my plate, so God save me,

la!

FALSTAFF

Let it alone; I'll make other shift: you'll be a

fool still.

MISTRESS QUICKLY

Well, you shall have it, though I pawn my gown. I

hope you'll come to supper. You'll pay me all together?

FALSTAFF

Will I live?

To BARDOLPH

Go, with her, with her; hook on, hook on.

MISTRESS QUICKLY

Will you have Doll Tearsheet meet you at supper?

FALSTAFF

No more words; let's have her.

Exeunt MISTRESS QUICKLY, BARDOLPH, Officers and Boy

Lord Chief-Justice I have heard better news.

FALSTAFF

What's the news, my lord?

Lord Chief-Justice Where lay the king last night?

GOWER

At Basingstoke, my lord.

FALSTAFF

I hope, my lord, all's well: what is the news, my lord?

Lord Chief-Justice Come all his forces back?

GOWER

No; fifteen hundred foot, five hundred horse,

Are marched up to my lord of Lancaster,

Against Northumberland and the Archbishop.

FALSTAFF

Comes the king back from Wales, my noble lord?

Lord Chief-Justice You shall have letters of me presently:

Come, go along with me, good Master Gower.

FALSTAFF

My lord!

Lord Chief-Justice What's the matter?

FALSTAFF

Master Gower, shall I entreat you with me to dinner?

GOWER

I must wait upon my good lord here; I thank you,

good Sir John.

Lord Chief-Justice Sir John, you loiter here too long, being you are to

take soldiers up in counties as you go.

FALSTAFF

Will you sup with me, Master Gower?

Lord Chief-Justice What foolish master taught you these manners, Sir John?

FALSTAFF

Master Gower, if they become me not, he was a fool

that taught them me. This is the right fencing

grace, my lord; tap for tap, and so part fair.

Lord Chief-Justice Now the Lord lighten thee! thou art a great fool.

Exeunt

SCENE 2

London. Another street.

Enter PRINCE HENRY and POINS

PRINCE HENRY

Before God, I am exceeding weary.

POINS

Is't come to that? I had thought weariness durst not

have attached one of so high blood.

PRINCE HENRY

Faith, it does me; though it discolours the

complexion of my greatness to acknowledge it. Doth

it not show vilely in me to desire small beer?

POINS

Why, a prince should not be so loosely studied as

to remember so weak a composition.

PRINCE HENRY

Belike then my appetite was not princely got; for,

by my troth, I do now remember the poor creature,

small beer. But, indeed, these humble

considerations make me out of love with my

greatness. What a disgrace is it to me to remember

thy name! or to know thy face to-morrow! or to

take note how many pair of silk stockings thou

hast, viz. these, and those that were thy

peach-coloured ones! or to bear the inventory of thy

shirts, as, one for superfluity, and another for

use! But that the tennis-court-keeper knows better

than I; for it is a low ebb of linen with thee when

thou keepest not racket there; as thou hast not done

a great while, because the rest of thy low

countries have made a shift to eat up thy holland:

and God knows, whether those that bawl out the ruins

of thy linen shall inherit his kingdom: but the

midwives say the children are not in the fault;

whereupon the world increases, and kindreds are

mightily strengthened.

POINS

How ill it follows, after you have laboured so hard,

you should talk so idly! Tell me, how many good

young princes would do so, their fathers being so

sick as yours at this time is?

PRINCE HENRY

Shall I tell thee one thing, Poins?

POINS

Yes, faith; and let it be an excellent good thing.

PRINCE HENRY

It shall serve among wits of no higher breeding than thine.

POINS

Go to; I stand the push of your one thing that you

will tell.

PRINCE HENRY

Marry, I tell thee, it is not meet that I should be

sad, now my father is sick: albeit I could tell

thee, as to one it pleases me, for fault of a

better, to call my friend, I could be sad, and sad

indeed too.

POINS

Very hardly upon such a subject.

PRINCE HENRY

By this hand thou thinkest me as far in the devil's

book as thou and Falstaff for obduracy and

persistency: let the end try the man. But I tell

thee, my heart bleeds inwardly that my father is so

sick: and keeping such vile company as thou art

hath in reason taken from me all ostentation of sorrow.

POINS

The reason?

PRINCE HENRY

What wouldst thou think of me, if I should weep?

POINS

I would think thee a most princely hypocrite.

PRINCE HENRY

It would be every man's thought; and thou art a

blessed fellow to think as every man thinks: never

a man's thought in the world keeps the road-way

better than thine: every man would think me an

hypocrite indeed. And what accites your most

worshipful thought to think so?

POINS

Why, because you have been so lewd and so much

engraffed to Falstaff.

PRINCE HENRY

And to thee.

POINS

By this light, I am well spoke on; I can hear it

with my own ears: the worst that they can say of

me is that I am a second brother and that I am a

proper fellow of my hands; and those two things, I

confess, I cannot help. By the mass, here comes Bardolph.

Enter BARDOLPH and Page

PRINCE HENRY

And the boy that I gave Falstaff: a' had him from

me Christian; and look, if the fat villain have not

transformed him ape.

BARDOLPH

God save your grace!

PRINCE HENRY

And yours, most noble Bardolph!

BARDOLPH

Come, you virtuous ass, you bashful fool, must you

be blushing? wherefore blush you now? What a

maidenly man-at-arms are you become! Is't such a

matter to get a pottle-pot's maidenhead?

Page

A' calls me e'en now, my lord, through a red

lattice, and I could discern no part of his face

from the window: at last I spied his eyes, and

methought he had made two holes in the ale-wife's

new petticoat and so peeped through.

PRINCE HENRY

Has not the boy profited?

BARDOLPH

Away, you whoreson upright rabbit, away!

Page

Away, you rascally Althaea's dream, away!

PRINCE HENRY

Instruct us, boy; what dream, boy?

Page

Marry, my lord, Althaea dreamed she was delivered

of a fire-brand; and therefore I call him her dream.

PRINCE HENRY

A crown's worth of good interpretation: there 'tis,

boy.

POINS

O, that this good blossom could be kept from

cankers! Well, there is sixpence to preserve thee.

BARDOLPH

An you do not make him hanged among you, the

gallows shall have wrong.

PRINCE HENRY

And how doth thy master, Bardolph?

BARDOLPH

Well, my lord. He heard of your grace's coming to

town: there's a letter for you.

POINS

Delivered with good respect. And how doth the

martlemas, your master?

BARDOLPH

In bodily health, sir.

POINS

Marry, the immortal part needs a physician; but

that moves not him: though that be sick, it dies

not.

PRINCE HENRY

I do allow this wen to be as familiar with me as my

dog; and he holds his place; for look you how be writes.

POINS

[Reads] 'John Falstaff, knight,'--every man must

know that, as oft as he has occasion to name

himself: even like those that are kin to the king;

for they never prick their finger but they say,

'There's some of the king's blood spilt.' 'How

comes that?' says he, that takes upon him not to

conceive. The answer is as ready as a borrower's

cap, 'I am the king's poor cousin, sir.'

PRINCE HENRY

Nay, they will be kin to us, or they will fetch it

from Japhet. But to the letter.

POINS

[Reads] 'Sir John Falstaff, knight, to the son of

the king, nearest his father, Harry Prince of

Wales, greeting.' Why, this is a certificate.

PRINCE HENRY

Peace!

POINS

[Reads] 'I will imitate the honourable Romans in

brevity:' he sure means brevity in breath,

short-winded. 'I commend me to thee, I commend

thee, and I leave thee. Be not too familiar with

Poins; for he misuses thy favours so much, that he

swears thou art to marry his sister Nell. Repent

at idle times as thou mayest; and so, farewell.

Thine, by yea and no, which is as much as to

say, as thou usest him, JACK FALSTAFF with my

familiars, JOHN with my brothers and sisters,

and SIR JOHN with all Europe.'

My lord, I'll steep this letter in sack and make him eat it.

PRINCE HENRY

That's to make him eat twenty of his words. But do

you use me thus, Ned? must I marry your sister?

POINS

God send the wench no worse fortune! But I never said so.

PRINCE HENRY

Well, thus we play the fools with the time, and the

spirits of the wise sit in the clouds and mock us.

Is your master here in London?

BARDOLPH

Yea, my lord.

PRINCE HENRY

Where sups he? doth the old boar feed in the old frank?

BARDOLPH

At the old place, my lord, in Eastcheap.

PRINCE HENRY

What company?

Page

Ephesians, my lord, of the old church.

PRINCE HENRY

Sup any women with him?

Page

None, my lord, but old Mistress Quickly and

Mistress Doll Tearsheet.

PRINCE HENRY

What pagan may that be?

Page

A proper gentlewoman, sir, and a kinswoman of my master's.

PRINCE HENRY

Even such kin as the parish heifers are to the town

bull. Shall we steal upon them, Ned, at supper?

POINS

I am your shadow, my lord; I'll follow you.

PRINCE HENRY

Sirrah, you boy, and Bardolph, no word to your

master that I am yet come to town: there's for

your silence.

BARDOLPH

I have no tongue, sir.

Page

And for mine, sir, I will govern it.

PRINCE HENRY

Fare you well; go.

Exeunt BARDOLPH and Page

This Doll Tearsheet should be some road.

POINS

I warrant you, as common as the way between Saint

Alban's and London.

PRINCE HENRY

How might we see Falstaff bestow himself to-night

in his true colours, and not ourselves be seen?

POINS

Put on two leathern jerkins and aprons, and wait

upon him at his table as drawers.

PRINCE HENRY

From a God to a bull? a heavy decension! it was

Jove's case. From a prince to a prentice? a low

transformation! that shall be mine; for in every

thing the purpose must weigh with the folly.

Follow me, Ned.

Exeunt

SCENE 3

Warkworth. Before the castle.

Enter NORTHUMBERLAND, LADY NORTHUMBERLAND, and LADY PERCY

NORTHUMBERLAND

I pray thee, loving wife, and gentle daughter,

Give even way unto my rough affairs:

Put not you on the visage of the times

And be like them to Percy troublesome.

LADY

NORTHUMBERLAND

I have given over, I will speak no more:

Do what you will; your wisdom be your guide.

NORTHUMBERLAND

Alas, sweet wife, my honour is at pawn;

And, but my going, nothing can redeem it.

LADY PERCY

O yet, for God's sake, go not to these wars!

The time was, father, that you broke your word,

When you were more endeared to it than now;

When your own Percy, when my heart's dear Harry,

Threw many a northward look to see his father

Bring up his powers; but he did long in vain.

Who then persuaded you to stay at home?

There were two honours lost, yours and your son's.

For yours, the God of heaven brighten it!

For his, it stuck upon him as the sun

In the grey vault of heaven, and by his light

Did all the chivalry of England move

To do brave acts: he was indeed the glass

Wherein the noble youth did dress themselves:

He had no legs that practised not his gait;

And speaking thick, which nature made his blemish,

Became the accents of the valiant;

For those that could speak low and tardily

Would turn their own perfection to abuse,

To seem like him: so that in speech, in gait,

In diet, in affections of delight,

In military rules, humours of blood,

He was the mark and glass, copy and book,

That fashion'd others. And him, O wondrous him!

O miracle of men! him did you leave,

Second to none, unseconded by you,

To look upon the hideous god of war

In disadvantage; to abide a field

Where nothing but the sound of Hotspur's name

Did seem defensible: so you left him.

Never, O never, do his ghost the wrong

To hold your honour more precise and nice

With others than with him! let them alone:

The marshal and the archbishop are strong:

Had my sweet Harry had but half their numbers,

To-day might I, hanging on Hotspur's neck,

Have talk'd of Monmouth's grave.

NORTHUMBERLAND

Beshrew your heart,

Fair daughter, you do draw my spirits from me

With new lamenting ancient oversights.

But I must go and meet with danger there,

Or it will seek me in another place

And find me worse provided.

LADY

NORTHUMBERLAND

O, fly to Scotland,

Till that the nobles and the armed commons

Have of their puissance made a little taste.

LADY PERCY

If they get ground and vantage of the king,

Then join you with them, like a rib of steel,

To make strength stronger; but, for all our loves,

First let them try themselves. So did your son;

He was so suffer'd: so came I a widow;

And never shall have length of life enough

To rain upon remembrance with mine eyes,

That it may grow and sprout as high as heaven,

For recordation to my noble husband.

NORTHUMBERLAND

Come, come, go in with me. 'Tis with my mind

As with the tide swell'd up unto his height,

That makes a still-stand, running neither way:

Fain would I go to meet the archbishop,

But many thousand reasons hold me back.

I will resolve for Scotland: there am I,

Till time and vantage crave my company.

Exeunt

SCENE 4

London. The Boar's-head Tavern in Eastcheap.

Enter two Drawers

First Drawer

What the devil hast thou brought there? apple-johns?

thou knowest Sir John cannot endure an apple-john.

Second Drawer

Mass, thou sayest true. The prince once set a dish

of apple-johns before him, and told him there were

five more Sir Johns, and, putting off his hat, said

'I will now take my leave of these six dry, round,

old, withered knights.' It angered him to the

heart: but he hath forgot that.

First Drawer

Why, then, cover, and set them down: and see if

thou canst find out Sneak's noise; Mistress

Tearsheet would fain hear some music. Dispatch: the

room where they supped is too hot; they'll come in straight.

Second Drawer

Sirrah, here will be the prince and Master Poins

anon; and they will put on two of our jerkins and

aprons; and Sir John must not know of it: Bardolph

hath brought word.

First Drawer

By the mass, here will be old Utis: it will be an

excellent stratagem.

Second Drawer

I'll see if I can find out Sneak.

Exit

Enter MISTRESS QUICKLY and DOLL TEARSHEET

MISTRESS QUICKLY

I' faith, sweetheart, methinks now you are in an

excellent good temperality: your pulsidge beats as

extraordinarily as heart would desire; and your

colour, I warrant you, is as red as any rose, in good

truth, la! But, i' faith, you have drunk too much

canaries; and that's a marvellous searching wine,

and it perfumes the blood ere one can say 'What's

this?' How do you now?

DOLL TEARSHEET

Better than I was: hem!

MISTRESS QUICKLY

Why, that's well said; a good heart's worth gold.

Lo, here comes Sir John.

Enter FALSTAFF

FALSTAFF

[Singing] 'When Arthur first in court,'

--Empty the jordan.

Exit First Drawer

Singing

--'And was a worthy king.' How now, Mistress Doll!

MISTRESS QUICKLY

Sick of a calm; yea, good faith.

FALSTAFF

So is all her sect; an they be once in a calm, they are sick.

DOLL TEARSHEET

You muddy rascal, is that all the comfort you give me?

FALSTAFF

You make fat rascals, Mistress Doll.

DOLL TEARSHEET

I make them! gluttony and diseases make them; I

make them not.

FALSTAFF

If the cook help to make the gluttony, you help to

make the diseases, Doll: we catch of you, Doll, we

catch of you; grant that, my poor virtue grant that.

DOLL TEARSHEET

Yea, joy, our chains and our jewels.

FALSTAFF

'Your broaches, pearls, and ouches:' for to serve

bravely is to come halting off, you know: to come

off the breach with his pike bent bravely, and to

surgery bravely; to venture upon the charged

chambers bravely,--

DOLL TEARSHEET

Hang yourself, you muddy conger, hang yourself!

MISTRESS QUICKLY

By my troth, this is the old fashion; you two never

meet but you fall to some discord: you are both,

i' good truth, as rheumatic as two dry toasts; you

cannot one bear with another's confirmities. What

the good-year! one must bear, and that must be

you: you are the weaker vessel, as they say, the

emptier vessel.

DOLL TEARSHEET

Can a weak empty vessel bear such a huge full

hogshead? there's a whole merchant's venture of

Bourdeaux stuff in him; you have not seen a hulk

better stuffed in the hold. Come, I'll be friends

with thee, Jack: thou art going to the wars; and

whether I shall ever see thee again or no, there is

nobody cares.

Re-enter First Drawer

First Drawer

Sir, Ancient Pistol's below, and would speak with

you.

DOLL TEARSHEET

Hang him, swaggering rascal! let him not come

hither: it is the foul-mouthed'st rogue in England.

MISTRESS QUICKLY

If he swagger, let him not come here: no, by my

faith; I must live among my neighbours: I'll no

swaggerers: I am in good name and fame with the

very best: shut the door; there comes no swaggerers

here: I have not lived all this while, to have

swaggering now: shut the door, I pray you.

FALSTAFF

Dost thou hear, hostess?

MISTRESS QUICKLY

Pray ye, pacify yourself, Sir John: there comes no

swaggerers here.

FALSTAFF

Dost thou hear? it is mine ancient.

MISTRESS QUICKLY

Tilly-fally, Sir John, ne'er tell me: your ancient

swaggerer comes not in my doors. I was before Master

Tisick, the debuty, t'other day; and, as he said to

me, 'twas no longer ago than Wednesday last, 'I'

good faith, neighbour Quickly,' says he; Master

Dumbe, our minister, was by then; 'neighbour

Quickly,' says he, 'receive those that are civil;

for,' said he, 'you are in an ill name:' now a'

said so, I can tell whereupon; 'for,' says he, 'you

are an honest woman, and well thought on; therefore

take heed what guests you receive: receive,' says

he, 'no swaggering companions.' There comes none

here: you would bless you to hear what he said:

no, I'll no swaggerers.

FALSTAFF

He's no swaggerer, hostess; a tame cheater, i'

faith; you may stroke him as gently as a puppy

greyhound: he'll not swagger with a Barbary hen, if

her feathers turn back in any show of resistance.

Call him up, drawer.

Exit First Drawer

MISTRESS QUICKLY

Cheater, call you him? I will bar no honest man my

house, nor no cheater: but I do not love

swaggering, by my troth; I am the worse, when one

says swagger: feel, masters, how I shake; look you,

I warrant you.

DOLL TEARSHEET

So you do, hostess.

MISTRESS QUICKLY

Do I? yea, in very truth, do I, an 'twere an aspen

leaf: I cannot abide swaggerers.

Enter PISTOL, BARDOLPH, and Page

PISTOL

God save you, Sir John!

FALSTAFF

Welcome, Ancient Pistol. Here, Pistol, I charge

you with a cup of sack: do you discharge upon mine hostess.

PISTOL

I will discharge upon her, Sir John, with two bullets.

FALSTAFF

She is Pistol-proof, sir; you shall hardly offend

her.

MISTRESS QUICKLY

Come, I'll drink no proofs nor no bullets: I'll

drink no more than will do me good, for no man's

pleasure, I.

PISTOL

Then to you, Mistress Dorothy; I will charge you.

DOLL TEARSHEET

Charge me! I scorn you, scurvy companion. What!

you poor, base, rascally, cheating, lack-linen

mate! Away, you mouldy rogue, away! I am meat for

your master.

PISTOL

I know you, Mistress Dorothy.

DOLL TEARSHEET

Away, you cut-purse rascal! you filthy bung, away!

by this wine, I'll thrust my knife in your mouldy

chaps, an you play the saucy cuttle with me. Away,

you bottle-ale rascal! you basket-hilt stale

juggler, you! Since when, I pray you, sir? God's

light, with two points on your shoulder? much!

PISTOL

God let me not live, but I will murder your ruff for this.

FALSTAFF

No more, Pistol; I would not have you go off here:

discharge yourself of our company, Pistol.

MISTRESS QUICKLY

No, Good Captain Pistol; not here, sweet captain.

DOLL TEARSHEET

Captain! thou abominable damned cheater, art thou

not ashamed to be called captain? An captains were

of my mind, they would truncheon you out, for

taking their names upon you before you have earned

them. You a captain! you slave, for what? for

tearing a poor whore's ruff in a bawdy-house? He a

captain! hang him, rogue! he lives upon mouldy

stewed prunes and dried cakes. A captain! God's

light, these villains will make the word as odious

as the word 'occupy;' which was an excellent good

word before it was ill sorted: therefore captains

had need look to 't.

BARDOLPH

Pray thee, go down, good ancient.

FALSTAFF

Hark thee hither, Mistress Doll.

PISTOL

Not I I tell thee what, Corporal Bardolph, I could

tear her: I'll be revenged of her.

Page

Pray thee, go down.

PISTOL

I'll see her damned first; to Pluto's damned lake,

by this hand, to the infernal deep, with Erebus and

tortures vile also. Hold hook and line, say I.

Down, down, dogs! down, faitors! Have we not

Hiren here?

MISTRESS QUICKLY

Good Captain Peesel, be quiet; 'tis very late, i'

faith: I beseek you now, aggravate your choler.

PISTOL

These be good humours, indeed! Shall pack-horses

And hollow pamper'd jades of Asia,

Which cannot go but thirty mile a-day,

Compare with Caesars, and with Cannibals,

And Trojan Greeks? nay, rather damn them with

King Cerberus; and let the welkin roar.

Shall we fall foul for toys?

MISTRESS QUICKLY

By my troth, captain, these are very bitter words.

BARDOLPH

Be gone, good ancient: this will grow to abrawl anon.

PISTOL

Die men like dogs! give crowns like pins! Have we

not Heren here?

MISTRESS QUICKLY

O' my word, captain, there's none such here. What

the good-year! do you think I would deny her? For

God's sake, be quiet.

PISTOL

Then feed, and be fat, my fair Calipolis.

Come, give's some sack.

'Si fortune me tormente, sperato me contento.'

Fear we broadsides? no, let the fiend give fire:

Give me some sack: and, sweetheart, lie thou there.

Laying down his sword

Come we to full points here; and are etceteras nothing?

FALSTAFF

Pistol, I would be quiet.

PISTOL

Sweet knight, I kiss thy neaf: what! we have seen

the seven stars.

DOLL TEARSHEET

For God's sake, thrust him down stairs: I cannot

endure such a fustian rascal.

PISTOL

Thrust him down stairs! know we not Galloway nags?

FALSTAFF

Quoit him down, Bardolph, like a shove-groat

shilling: nay, an a' do nothing but speak nothing,

a' shall be nothing here.

BARDOLPH

Come, get you down stairs.

PISTOL

What! shall we have incision? shall we imbrue?

Snatching up his sword

Then death rock me asleep, abridge my doleful days!

Why, then, let grievous, ghastly, gaping wounds

Untwine the Sisters Three! Come, Atropos, I say!

MISTRESS QUICKLY

Here's goodly stuff toward!

FALSTAFF

Give me my rapier, boy.

DOLL TEARSHEET

I pray thee, Jack, I pray thee, do not draw.

FALSTAFF

Get you down stairs.

Drawing, and driving PISTOL out

MISTRESS QUICKLY

Here's a goodly tumult! I'll forswear keeping

house, afore I'll be in these tirrits and frights.

So; murder, I warrant now. Alas, alas! put up

your naked weapons, put up your naked weapons.

Exeunt PISTOL and BARDOLPH

DOLL TEARSHEET

I pray thee, Jack, be quiet; the rascal's gone.

Ah, you whoreson little valiant villain, you!

MISTRESS QUICKLY

He you not hurt i' the groin? methought a' made a

shrewd thrust at your belly.

Re-enter BARDOLPH

FALSTAFF

Have you turned him out o' doors?

BARDOLPH

Yea, sir. The rascal's drunk: you have hurt him,

sir, i' the shoulder.

FALSTAFF

A rascal! to brave me!

DOLL TEARSHEET

Ah, you sweet little rogue, you! alas, poor ape,

how thou sweatest! come, let me wipe thy face;

come on, you whoreson chops: ah, rogue! i'faith, I

love thee: thou art as valorous as Hector of Troy,

worth five of Agamemnon, and ten times better than

the Nine Worthies: ah, villain!

FALSTAFF

A rascally slave! I will toss the rogue in a blanket.

DOLL TEARSHEET

Do, an thou darest for thy heart: an thou dost,

I'll canvass thee between a pair of sheets.

Enter Music

Page

The music is come, sir.

FALSTAFF

Let them play. Play, sirs. Sit on my knee, Doll.

A rascal bragging slave! the rogue fled from me

like quicksilver.

DOLL TEARSHEET

I' faith, and thou followedst him like a church.

Thou whoreson little tidy Bartholomew boar-pig,

when wilt thou leave fighting o' days and foining

o' nights, and begin to patch up thine old body for heaven?

Enter, behind, PRINCE HENRY and POINS, disguised

FALSTAFF

Peace, good Doll! do not speak like a death's-head;

do not bid me remember mine end.

DOLL TEARSHEET

Sirrah, what humour's the prince of?

FALSTAFF

A good shallow young fellow: a' would have made a

good pantler, a' would ha' chipp'd bread well.

DOLL TEARSHEET

They say Poins has a good wit.

FALSTAFF

He a good wit? hang him, baboon! his wit's as thick

as Tewksbury mustard; there's no more conceit in him

than is in a mallet.

DOLL TEARSHEET

Why does the prince love him so, then?

FALSTAFF

Because their legs are both of a bigness, and a'

plays at quoits well, and eats conger and fennel,

and drinks off candles' ends for flap-dragons, and

rides the wild-mare with the boys, and jumps upon

joined-stools, and swears with a good grace, and

wears his boots very smooth, like unto the sign of

the leg, and breeds no bate with telling of discreet

stories; and such other gambol faculties a' has,

that show a weak mind and an able body, for the

which the prince admits him: for the prince himself

is such another; the weight of a hair will turn the

scales between their avoirdupois.

PRINCE HENRY

Would not this nave of a wheel have his ears cut off?

POINS

Let's beat him before his whore.

PRINCE HENRY

Look, whether the withered elder hath not his poll

clawed like a parrot.

POINS

Is it not strange that desire should so many years

outlive performance?

FALSTAFF

Kiss me, Doll.

PRINCE HENRY

Saturn and Venus this year in conjunction! what

says the almanac to that?

POINS

And look, whether the fiery Trigon, his man, be not

lisping to his master's old tables, his note-book,

his counsel-keeper.

FALSTAFF

Thou dost give me flattering busses.

DOLL TEARSHEET

By my troth, I kiss thee with a most constant heart.

FALSTAFF

I am old, I am old.

DOLL TEARSHEET

I love thee better than I love e'er a scurvy young

boy of them all.

FALSTAFF

What stuff wilt have a kirtle of? I shall receive

money o' Thursday: shalt have a cap to-morrow. A

merry song, come: it grows late; we'll to bed.

Thou'lt forget me when I am gone.

DOLL TEARSHEET

By my troth, thou'lt set me a-weeping, an thou

sayest so: prove that ever I dress myself handsome

till thy return: well, harken at the end.

FALSTAFF

Some sack, Francis.

PRINCE HENRY POINS

Anon, anon, sir.

Coming forward

FALSTAFF

Ha! a bastard son of the king's? And art not thou

Poins his brother?

PRINCE HENRY

Why, thou globe of sinful continents! what a life

dost thou lead!

FALSTAFF

A better than thou: I am a gentleman; thou art a drawer.

PRINCE HENRY

Very true, sir; and I come to draw you out by the ears.

MISTRESS QUICKLY

O, the Lord preserve thy good grace! by my troth,

welcome to London. Now, the Lord bless that sweet

face of thine! O, Jesu, are you come from Wales?

FALSTAFF

Thou whoreson mad compound of majesty, by this light

flesh and corrupt blood, thou art welcome.

DOLL TEARSHEET

How, you fat fool! I scorn you.

POINS

My lord, he will drive you out of your revenge and

turn all to a merriment, if you take not the heat.

PRINCE HENRY

You whoreson candle-mine, you, how vilely did you

speak of me even now before this honest, virtuous,

civil gentlewoman!

MISTRESS QUICKLY

God's blessing of your good heart! and so she is,

by my troth.

FALSTAFF

Didst thou hear me?

PRINCE HENRY

Yea, and you knew me, as you did when you ran away

by Gad's-hill: you knew I was at your back, and

spoke it on purpose to try my patience.

FALSTAFF

No, no, no; not so; I did not think thou wast within hearing.

PRINCE HENRY

I shall drive you then to confess the wilful abuse;

and then I know how to handle you.

FALSTAFF

No abuse, Hal, o' mine honour, no abuse.

PRINCE HENRY

Not to dispraise me, and call me pantier and

bread-chipper and I know not what?

FALSTAFF

No abuse, Hal.

POINS

No abuse?

FALSTAFF

No abuse, Ned, i' the world; honest Ned, none. I

dispraised him before the wicked, that the wicked

might not fall in love with him; in which doing, I

have done the part of a careful friend and a true

subject, and thy father is to give me thanks for it.

No abuse, Hal: none, Ned, none: no, faith, boys, none.

PRINCE HENRY

See now, whether pure fear and entire cowardice doth

not make thee wrong this virtuous gentlewoman to

close with us? is she of the wicked? is thine

hostess here of the wicked? or is thy boy of the

wicked? or honest Bardolph, whose zeal burns in his

nose, of the wicked?

POINS

Answer, thou dead elm, answer.

FALSTAFF

The fiend hath pricked down Bardolph irrecoverable;

and his face is Lucifer's privy-kitchen, where he

doth nothing but roast malt-worms. For the boy,

there is a good angel about him; but the devil

outbids him too.

PRINCE HENRY

For the women?

FALSTAFF

For one of them, she is in hell already, and burns

poor souls. For the other, I owe her money, and

whether she be damned for that, I know not.

MISTRESS QUICKLY

No, I warrant you.

FALSTAFF

No, I think thou art not; I think thou art quit for

that. Marry, there is another indictment upon thee,

for suffering flesh to be eaten in thy house,

contrary to the law; for the which I think thou wilt howl.

MISTRESS QUICKLY

All victuallers do so; what's a joint of mutton or

two in a whole Lent?

PRINCE HENRY

You, gentlewoman,-

DOLL TEARSHEET

What says your grace?

FALSTAFF

His grace says that which his flesh rebels against.

Knocking within

MISTRESS QUICKLY

Who knocks so loud at door? Look to the door there, Francis.

Enter PETO

PRINCE HENRY

Peto, how now! what news?

PETO

The king your father is at Westminster:

And there are twenty weak and wearied posts

Come from the north: and, as I came along,

I met and overtook a dozen captains,

Bare-headed, sweating, knocking at the taverns,

And asking every one for Sir John Falstaff.

PRINCE HENRY

By heaven, Poins, I feel me much to blame,

So idly to profane the precious time,

When tempest of commotion, like the south

Borne with black vapour, doth begin to melt

And drop upon our bare unarmed heads.

Give me my sword and cloak. Falstaff, good night.

Exeunt PRINCE HENRY, POINS, PETO and BARDOLPH

FALSTAFF

Now comes in the sweetest morsel of the night, and

we must hence and leave it unpicked.

Knocking within

More knocking at the door!

Re-enter BARDOLPH

How now! what's the matter?

BARDOLPH

You must away to court, sir, presently;

A dozen captains stay at door for you.

FALSTAFF

[To the Page] Pay the musicians, sirrah. Farewell,

hostess; farewell, Doll. You see, my good wenches,

how men of merit are sought after: the undeserver

may sleep, when the man of action is called on.

Farewell good wenches: if I be not sent away post,

I will see you again ere I go.

DOLL TEARSHEET

I cannot speak; if my heart be not read to burst,--

well, sweet Jack, have a care of thyself.

FALSTAFF

Farewell, farewell.

Exeunt FALSTAFF and BARDOLPH

MISTRESS QUICKLY

Well, fare thee well: I have known thee these

twenty-nine years, come peascod-time; but an

honester and truer-hearted man,--well, fare thee well.

BARDOLPH

[Within] Mistress Tearsheet!

MISTRESS QUICKLY

What's the matter?

BARDOLPH

[Within] Good Mistress Tearsheet, come to my master.

MISTRESS QUICKLY

O, run, Doll, run; run, good Doll: come.

She comes blubbered

Yea, will you come, Doll?

Exeunt

ACT 3

SCENE 1

Westminster. The palace.

Enter KING HENRY IV in his nightgown, with a Page

KING HENRY IV

Go call the Earls of Surrey and of Warwick;

But, ere they come, bid them o'er-read these letters,

And well consider of them; make good speed.

Exit Page

How many thousand of my poorest subjects

Are at this hour asleep! O sleep, O gentle sleep,

Nature's soft nurse, how have I frighted thee,

That thou no more wilt weigh my eyelids down

And steep my senses in forgetfulness?

Why rather, sleep, liest thou in smoky cribs,

Upon uneasy pallets stretching thee

And hush'd with buzzing night-flies to thy slumber,

Than in the perfumed chambers of the great,

Under the canopies of costly state,

And lull'd with sound of sweetest melody?

O thou dull god, why liest thou with the vile

In loathsome beds, and leavest the kingly couch

A watch-case or a common 'larum-bell?

Wilt thou upon the high and giddy mast

Seal up the ship-boy's eyes, and rock his brains

In cradle of the rude imperious surge

And in the visitation of the winds,

Who take the ruffian billows by the top,

Curling their monstrous heads and hanging them

With deafening clamour in the slippery clouds,

That, with the hurly, death itself awakes?

Canst thou, O partial sleep, give thy repose

To the wet sea-boy in an hour so rude,

And in the calmest and most stillest night,

With all appliances and means to boot,

Deny it to a king? Then happy low, lie down!

Uneasy lies the head that wears a crown.

Enter WARWICK and SURREY

WARWICK

Many good morrows to your majesty!

KING HENRY IV

Is it good morrow, lords?

WARWICK

'Tis one o'clock, and past.

KING HENRY IV

Why, then, good morrow to you all, my lords.

Have you read o'er the letters that I sent you?

WARWICK

We have, my liege.

KING HENRY IV

Then you perceive the body of our kingdom

How foul it is; what rank diseases grow

And with what danger, near the heart of it.

WARWICK

It is but as a body yet distemper'd;

Which to his former strength may be restored

With good advice and little medicine:

My Lord Northumberland will soon be cool'd.

KING HENRY IV

O God! that one might read the book of fate,

And see the revolution of the times

Make mountains level, and the continent,

Weary of solid firmness, melt itself

Into the sea! and, other times, to see

The beachy girdle of the ocean

Too wide for Neptune's hips; how chances mock,

And changes fill the cup of alteration

With divers liquors! O, if this were seen,

The happiest youth, viewing his progress through,

What perils past, what crosses to ensue,

Would shut the book, and sit him down and die.

'Tis not 'ten years gone

Since Richard and Northumberland, great friends,

Did feast together, and in two years after

Were they at wars: it is but eight years since

This Percy was the man nearest my soul,

Who like a brother toil'd in my affairs

And laid his love and life under my foot,

Yea, for my sake, even to the eyes of Richard

Gave him defiance. But which of you was by--

You, cousin Nevil, as I may remember--

To WARWICK

When Richard, with his eye brimful of tears,

Then cheque'd and rated by Northumberland,

Did speak these words, now proved a prophecy?

'Northumberland, thou ladder by the which

My cousin Bolingbroke ascends my throne;'

Though then, God knows, I had no such intent,

But that necessity so bow'd the state

That I and greatness were compell'd to kiss:

'The time shall come,' thus did he follow it,

'The time will come, that foul sin, gathering head,

Shall break into corruption:' so went on,

Foretelling this same time's condition

And the division of our amity.

WARWICK

There is a history in all men's lives,

Figuring the nature of the times deceased;

The which observed, a man may prophesy,

With a near aim, of the main chance of things

As yet not come to life, which in their seeds

And weak beginnings lie intreasured.

Such things become the hatch and brood of time;

And by the necessary form of this

King Richard might create a perfect guess

That great Northumberland, then false to him,

Would of that seed grow to a greater falseness;

Which should not find a ground to root upon,

Unless on you.

KING HENRY IV

Are these things then necessities?

Then let us meet them like necessities:

And that same word even now cries out on us:

They say the bishop and Northumberland

Are fifty thousand strong.

WARWICK

It cannot be, my lord;

Rumour doth double, like the voice and echo,

The numbers of the fear'd. Please it your grace

To go to bed. Upon my soul, my lord,

The powers that you already have sent forth

Shall bring this prize in very easily.

To comfort you the more, I have received

A certain instance that Glendower is dead.

Your majesty hath been this fortnight ill,

And these unseason'd hours perforce must add

Unto your sickness.

KING HENRY IV

I will take your counsel:

And were these inward wars once out of hand,

We would, dear lords, unto the Holy Land.

Exeunt

SCENE 2

Gloucestershire. Before SHALLOW'S house.

Enter SHALLOW and SILENCE, meeting; MOULDY, SHADOW, WART, FEEBLE, BULLCALF, a Servant or two with them

SHALLOW

Come on, come on, come on, sir; give me your hand,

sir, give me your hand, sir: an early stirrer, by

the rood! And how doth my good cousin Silence?

SILENCE

Good morrow, good cousin Shallow.

SHALLOW

And how doth my cousin, your bedfellow? and your

fairest daughter and mine, my god-daughter Ellen?

SILENCE

Alas, a black ousel, cousin Shallow!

SHALLOW

By yea and nay, sir, I dare say my cousin William is

become a good scholar: he is at Oxford still, is he not?

SILENCE

Indeed, sir, to my cost.

SHALLOW

A' must, then, to the inns o' court shortly. I was

once of Clement's Inn, where I think they will

talk of mad Shallow yet.

SILENCE

You were called 'lusty Shallow' then, cousin.

SHALLOW

By the mass, I was called any thing; and I would

have done any thing indeed too, and roundly too.

There was I, and little John Doit of Staffordshire,

and black George Barnes, and Francis Pickbone, and

Will Squele, a Cotswold man; you had not four such

swinge-bucklers in all the inns o' court again: and

I may say to you, we knew where the bona-robas were

and had the best of them all at commandment. Then

was Jack Falstaff, now Sir John, a boy, and page to

Thomas Mowbray, Duke of Norfolk.

SILENCE

This Sir John, cousin, that comes hither anon about soldiers?

SHALLOW

The same Sir John, the very same. I see him break

Skogan's head at the court-gate, when a' was a

crack not thus high: and the very same day did I

fight with one Sampson Stockfish, a fruiterer,

behind Gray's Inn. Jesu, Jesu, the mad days that I

have spent! and to see how many of my old

acquaintance are dead!

SILENCE

We shall all follow, cousin.

SHADOW

Certain, 'tis certain; very sure, very sure: death,

as the Psalmist saith, is certain to all; all shall

die. How a good yoke of bullocks at Stamford fair?

SILENCE

By my troth, I was not there.

SHALLOW

Death is certain. Is old Double of your town living

yet?

SILENCE

Dead, sir.

SHALLOW

Jesu, Jesu, dead! a' drew a good bow; and dead! a'

shot a fine shoot: John a Gaunt loved him well, and

betted much money on his head. Dead! a' would have

clapped i' the clout at twelve score; and carried

you a forehand shaft a fourteen and fourteen and a

half, that it would have done a man's heart good to

see. How a score of ewes now?

SILENCE

Thereafter as they be: a score of good ewes may be

worth ten pounds.

SHALLOW

And is old Double dead?

SILENCE

Here come two of Sir John Falstaff's men, as I think.

Enter BARDOLPH and one with him

BARDOLPH

Good morrow, honest gentlemen: I beseech you, which

is Justice Shallow?

SHALLOW

I am Robert Shallow, sir; a poor esquire of this

county, and one of the king's justices of th e peace:

What is your good pleasure with me?

BARDOLPH

My captain, sir, commends him to you; my captain,

Sir John Falstaff, a tall gentleman, by heaven, and

a most gallant leader.

SHALLOW

He greets me well, sir. I knew him a good backsword

man. How doth the good knight? may I ask how my

lady his wife doth?

BARDOLPH

Sir, pardon; a soldier is better accommodated than

with a wife.

SHALLOW

It is well said, in faith, sir; and it is well said

indeed too. Better accommodated! it is good; yea,

indeed, is it: good phrases are surely, and ever

were, very commendable. Accommodated! it comes of

'accommodo' very good; a good phrase.

BARDOLPH

Pardon me, sir; I have heard the word. Phrase call

you it? by this good day, I know not the phrase;

but I will maintain the word with my sword to be a

soldier-like word, and a word of exceeding good

command, by heaven. Accommodated; that is, when a

man is, as they say, accommodated; or when a man is,

being, whereby a' may be thought to be accommodated;

which is an excellent thing.

SHALLOW

It is very just.

Enter FALSTAFF

Look, here comes good Sir John. Give me your good

hand, give me your worship's good hand: by my

troth, you like well and bear your years very well:

welcome, good Sir John.

FALSTAFF

I am glad to see you well, good Master Robert

Shallow: Master Surecard, as I think?

SHALLOW

No, Sir John; it is my cousin Silence, in commission with me.

FALSTAFF

Good Master Silence, it well befits you should be of

the peace.

SILENCE

Your good-worship is welcome.

FALSTAFF

Fie! this is hot weather, gentlemen. Have you

provided me here half a dozen sufficient men?

SHALLOW

Marry, have we, sir. Will you sit?

FALSTAFF

Let me see them, I beseech you.

SHALLOW

Where's the roll? where's the roll? where's the

roll? Let me see, let me see, let me see. So, so:

yea, marry, sir: Ralph Mouldy! Let them appear as

I call; let them do so, let them do so. Let me

see; where is Mouldy?

MOULDY

Here, an't please you.

SHALLOW

What think you, Sir John? a good-limbed fellow;

young, strong, and of good friends.

FALSTAFF

Is thy name Mouldy?

MOULDY

Yea, an't please you.

FALSTAFF

'Tis the more time thou wert used.

SHALLOW

Ha, ha, ha! most excellent, i' faith! Things that

are mouldy lack use: very singular good! in faith,

well said, Sir John, very well said.

FALSTAFF

Prick him.

MOULDY

I was pricked well enough before, an you could have

let me alone: my old dame will be undone now for

one to do her husbandry and her drudgery: you need

not to have pricked me; there are other men fitter

to go out than I.

FALSTAFF

Go to: peace, Mouldy; you shall go. Mouldy, it is

time you were spent.

MOULDY

Spent!

SHALLOW

Peace, fellow, peace; stand aside: know you where

you are? For the other, Sir John: let me see:

Simon Shadow!

FALSTAFF

Yea, marry, let me have him to sit under: he's like

to be a cold soldier.

SHALLOW

Where's Shadow?

SHADOW

Here, sir.

FALSTAFF

Shadow, whose son art thou?

SHADOW

My mother's son, sir.

FALSTAFF

Thy mother's son! like enough, and thy father's

shadow: so the son of the female is the shadow of

the male: it is often so, indeed; but much of the

father's substance!

SHALLOW

Do you like him, Sir John?

FALSTAFF

Shadow will serve for summer; prick him, for we have

a number of shadows to fill up the muster-book.

SHALLOW

Thomas Wart!

FALSTAFF

Where's he?

WART

Here, sir.

FALSTAFF

Is thy name Wart?

WART

Yea, sir.

FALSTAFF

Thou art a very ragged wart.

SHALLOW

Shall I prick him down, Sir John?

FALSTAFF

It were superfluous; for his apparel is built upon

his back and the whole frame stands upon pins:

prick him no more.

SHALLOW

Ha, ha, ha! you can do it, sir; you can do it: I

commend you well. Francis Feeble!

FEEBLE

Here, sir.

FALSTAFF

What trade art thou, Feeble?

FEEBLE

A woman's tailor, sir.

SHALLOW

Shall I prick him, sir?

FALSTAFF

You may: but if he had been a man's tailor, he'ld

ha' pricked you. Wilt thou make as many holes in

an enemy's battle as thou hast done in a woman's petticoat?

FEEBLE

I will do my good will, sir; you can have no more.

FALSTAFF

Well said, good woman's tailor! well said,

courageous Feeble! thou wilt be as valiant as the

wrathful dove or most magnanimous mouse. Prick the

woman's tailor: well, Master Shallow; deep, Master Shallow.

FEEBLE

I would Wart might have gone, sir.

FALSTAFF

I would thou wert a man's tailor, that thou mightst

mend him and make him fit to go. I cannot put him

to a private soldier that is the leader of so many

thousands: let that suffice, most forcible Feeble.

FEEBLE

It shall suffice, sir.

FALSTAFF

I am bound to thee, reverend Feeble. Who is next?

SHALLOW

Peter Bullcalf o' the green!

FALSTAFF

Yea, marry, let's see Bullcalf.

BULLCALF

Here, sir.

FALSTAFF

'Fore God, a likely fellow! Come, prick me Bullcalf

till he roar again.

BULLCALF

O Lord! good my lord captain,--

FALSTAFF

What, dost thou roar before thou art pricked?

BULLCALF

O Lord, sir! I am a diseased man.

FALSTAFF

What disease hast thou?

BULLCALF

A whoreson cold, sir, a cough, sir, which I caught

with ringing in the king's affairs upon his

coronation-day, sir.

FALSTAFF

Come, thou shalt go to the wars in a gown; we wilt

have away thy cold; and I will take such order that

my friends shall ring for thee. Is here all?

SHALLOW

Here is two more called than your number, you must

have but four here, sir: and so, I pray you, go in

with me to dinner.

FALSTAFF

Come, I will go drink with you, but I cannot tarry

dinner. I am glad to see you, by my troth, Master Shallow.

SHALLOW

O, Sir John, do you remember since we lay all night

in the windmill in Saint George's field?

FALSTAFF

No more of that, good Master Shallow, no more of that.

SHALLOW

Ha! 'twas a merry night. And is Jane Nightwork alive?

FALSTAFF

She lives, Master Shallow.

SHALLOW

She never could away with me.

FALSTAFF

Never, never; she would always say she could not

abide Master Shallow.

SHALLOW

By the mass, I could anger her to the heart. She

was then a bona-roba. Doth she hold her own well?

FALSTAFF

Old, old, Master Shallow.

SHALLOW

Nay, she must be old; she cannot choose but be old;

certain she's old; and had Robin Nightwork by old

Nightwork before I came to Clement's Inn.

SILENCE

That's fifty-five year ago.

SHALLOW

Ha, cousin Silence, that thou hadst seen that that

this knight and I have seen! Ha, Sir John, said I well?

FALSTAFF

We have heard the chimes at midnight, Master Shallow.

SHALLOW

That we have, that we have, that we have; in faith,

Sir John, we have: our watch-word was 'Hem boys!'

Come, let's to dinner; come, let's to dinner:

Jesus, the days that we have seen! Come, come.

Exeunt FALSTAFF and Justices

BULLCALF

Good Master Corporate Bardolph, stand my friend;

and here's four Harry ten shillings in French crowns

for you. In very truth, sir, I had as lief be

hanged, sir, as go: and yet, for mine own part, sir,

I do not care; but rather, because I am unwilling,

and, for mine own part, have a desire to stay with

my friends; else, sir, I did not care, for mine own

part, so much.

BARDOLPH

Go to; stand aside.

MOULDY

And, good master corporal captain, for my old

dame's sake, stand my friend: she has nobody to do

any thing about her when I am gone; and she is old,

and cannot help herself: You shall have forty, sir.

BARDOLPH

Go to; stand aside.

FEEBLE

By my troth, I care not; a man can die but once: we

owe God a death: I'll ne'er bear a base mind:

an't be my destiny, so; an't be not, so: no man is

too good to serve's prince; and let it go which way

it will, he that dies this year is quit for the next.

BARDOLPH

Well said; thou'rt a good fellow.

FEEBLE

Faith, I'll bear no base mind.

Re-enter FALSTAFF and the Justices

FALSTAFF

Come, sir, which men shall I have?

SHALLOW

Four of which you please.

BARDOLPH

Sir, a word with you: I have three pound to free

Mouldy and Bullcalf.

FALSTAFF

Go to; well.

SHALLOW

Come, Sir John, which four will you have?

FALSTAFF

Do you choose for me.

SHALLOW

Marry, then, Mouldy, Bullcalf, Feeble and Shadow.

FALSTAFF

Mouldy and Bullcalf: for you, Mouldy, stay at home

till you are past service: and for your part,

Bullcalf, grow till you come unto it: I will none of you.

SHALLOW

Sir John, Sir John, do not yourself wrong: they are

your likeliest men, and I would have you served with the best.

FALSTAFF

Will you tell me, Master Shallow, how to choose a

man? Care I for the limb, the thewes, the stature,

bulk, and big assemblance of a man! Give me the

spirit, Master Shallow. Here's Wart; you see what a

ragged appearance it is; a' shall charge you and

discharge you with the motion of a pewterer's

hammer, come off and on swifter than he that gibbets

on the brewer's bucket. And this same half-faced

fellow, Shadow; give me this man: he presents no

mark to the enemy; the foeman may with as great aim

level at the edge of a penknife. And for a retreat;

how swiftly will this Feeble the woman's tailor run

off! O, give me the spare men, and spare me the

great ones. Put me a caliver into Wart's hand, Bardolph.

BARDOLPH

Hold, Wart, traverse; thus, thus, thus.

FALSTAFF

Come, manage me your caliver. So: very well: go

to: very good, exceeding good. O, give me always a

little, lean, old, chapt, bald shot. Well said, i'

faith, Wart; thou'rt a good scab: hold, there's a

tester for thee.

SHALLOW

He is not his craft's master; he doth not do it

right. I remember at Mile-end Green, when I lay at

Clement's Inn--I was then Sir Dagonet in Arthur's

show,--there was a little quiver fellow, and a'

would manage you his piece thus; and a' would about

and about, and come you in and come you in: 'rah,

tah, tah,' would a' say; 'bounce' would a' say; and

away again would a' go, and again would a' come: I

shall ne'er see such a fellow.

FALSTAFF

These fellows will do well, Master Shallow. God

keep you, Master Silence: I will not use many words

with you. Fare you well, gentlemen both: I thank

you: I must a dozen mile to-night. Bardolph, give

the soldiers coats.

SHALLOW

Sir John, the Lord bless you! God prosper your

affairs! God send us peace! At your return visit

our house; let our old acquaintance be renewed;

peradventure I will with ye to the court.

FALSTAFF

'Fore God, I would you would, Master Shallow.

SHALLOW

Go to; I have spoke at a word. God keep you.

FALSTAFF

Fare you well, gentle gentlemen.

Exeunt Justices

On, Bardolph; lead the men away.

Exeunt BARDOLPH, Recruits, & c

As I return, I will fetch off these justices: I do

see the bottom of Justice Shallow. Lord, Lord, how

subject we old men are to this vice of lying! This

same starved justice hath done nothing but prate to

me of the wildness of his youth, and the feats he

hath done about Turnbull Street: and every third

word a lie, duer paid to the hearer than the Turk's

tribute. I do remember him at Clement's Inn like a

man made after supper of a cheese-paring: when a'

was naked, he was, for all the world, like a forked

radish, with a head fantastically carved upon it

with a knife: a' was so forlorn, that his

dimensions to any thick sight were invincible: a'

was the very genius of famine; yet lecherous as a

monkey, and the whores called him mandrake: a' came

ever in the rearward of the fashion, and sung those

tunes to the overscutched huswives that he heard the

carmen whistle, and swear they were his fancies or

his good-nights. And now is this Vice's dagger

become a squire, and talks as familiarly of John a

Gaunt as if he had been sworn brother to him; and

I'll be sworn a' ne'er saw him but once in the

Tilt-yard; and then he burst his head for crowding

among the marshal's men. I saw it, and told John a

Gaunt he beat his own name; for you might have

thrust him and all his apparel into an eel-skin; the

case of a treble hautboy was a mansion for him, a

court: and now has he land and beefs. Well, I'll

be acquainted with him, if I return; and it shall

go hard but I will make him a philosopher's two

stones to me: if the young dace be a bait for the

old pike, I see no reason in the law of nature but I

may snap at him. Let time shape, and there an end.

Exit

ACT 4

SCENE 1

Yorkshire. Gaultree Forest.

Enter the ARCHBISHOP OF YORK, MOWBRAY, LORD HASTINGS, and others

ARCHBISHOP OF YORK

What is this forest call'd?

HASTINGS

'Tis Gaultree Forest, an't shall please your grace.

ARCHBISHOP OF YORK

Here stand, my lords; and send discoverers forth

To know the numbers of our enemies.

HASTINGS

We have sent forth already.

ARCHBISHOP OF YORK

'Tis well done.

My friends and brethren in these great affairs,

I must acquaint you that I have received

New-dated letters from Northumberland;

Their cold intent, tenor and substance, thus:

Here doth he wish his person, with such powers

As might hold sortance with his quality,

The which he could not levy; whereupon

He is retired, to ripe his growing fortunes,

To Scotland: and concludes in hearty prayers

That your attempts may overlive the hazard

And fearful melting of their opposite.

MOWBRAY

Thus do the hopes we have in him touch ground

And dash themselves to pieces.

Enter a Messenger

HASTINGS

Now, what news?

Messenger

West of this forest, scarcely off a mile,

In goodly form comes on the enemy;

And, by the ground they hide, I judge their number

Upon or near the rate of thirty thousand.

MOWBRAY

The just proportion that we gave them out

Let us sway on and face them in the field.

ARCHBISHOP OF YORK

What well-appointed leader fronts us here?

Enter WESTMORELAND

MOWBRAY

I think it is my Lord of Westmoreland.

WESTMORELAND

Health and fair greeting from our general,

The prince, Lord John and Duke of Lancaster.

ARCHBISHOP OF YORK

Say on, my Lord of Westmoreland, in peace:

What doth concern your coming?

WESTMORELAND

Then, my lord,

Unto your grace do I in chief address

The substance of my speech. If that rebellion

Came like itself, in base and abject routs,

Led on by bloody youth, guarded with rags,

And countenanced by boys and beggary,

I say, if damn'd commotion so appear'd,

In his true, native and most proper shape,

You, reverend father, and these noble lords

Had not been here, to dress the ugly form

Of base and bloody insurrection

With your fair honours. You, lord archbishop,

Whose see is by a civil peace maintained,

Whose beard the silver hand of peace hath touch'd,

Whose learning and good letters peace hath tutor'd,

Whose white investments figure innocence,

The dove and very blessed spirit of peace,

Wherefore do you so ill translate ourself

Out of the speech of peace that bears such grace,

Into the harsh and boisterous tongue of war;

Turning your books to graves, your ink to blood,

Your pens to lances and your tongue divine

To a trumpet and a point of war?

ARCHBISHOP OF YORK

Wherefore do I this? so the question stands.

Briefly to this end: we are all diseased,

And with our surfeiting and wanton hours

Have brought ourselves into a burning fever,

And we must bleed for it; of which disease

Our late king, Richard, being infected, died.

But, my most noble Lord of Westmoreland,

I take not on me here as a physician,

Nor do I as an enemy to peace

Troop in the throngs of military men;

But rather show awhile like fearful war,

To diet rank minds sick of happiness

And purge the obstructions which begin to stop

Our very veins of life. Hear me more plainly.

I have in equal balance justly weigh'd

What wrongs our arms may do, what wrongs we suffer,

And find our griefs heavier than our offences.

We see which way the stream of time doth run,

And are enforced from our most quiet there

By the rough torrent of occasion;

And have the summary of all our griefs,

When time shall serve, to show in articles;

Which long ere this we offer'd to the king,

And might by no suit gain our audience:

When we are wrong'd and would unfold our griefs,

We are denied access unto his person

Even by those men that most have done us wrong.

The dangers of the days but newly gone,

Whose memory is written on the earth

With yet appearing blood, and the examples

Of every minute's instance, present now,

Hath put us in these ill-beseeming arms,

Not to break peace or any branch of it,

But to establish here a peace indeed,

Concurring both in name and quality.

WESTMORELAND

When ever yet was your appeal denied?

Wherein have you been galled by the king?

What peer hath been suborn'd to grate on you,

That you should seal this lawless bloody book

Of forged rebellion with a seal divine

And consecrate commotion's bitter edge?

ARCHBISHOP OF YORK

My brother general, the commonwealth,

To brother born an household cruelty,

I make my quarrel in particular.

WESTMORELAND

There is no need of any such redress;

Or if there were, it not belongs to you.

MOWBRAY

Why not to him in part, and to us all

That feel the bruises of the days before,

And suffer the condition of these times

To lay a heavy and unequal hand

Upon our honours?

WESTMORELAND

O, my good Lord Mowbray,

Construe the times to their necessities,

And you shall say indeed, it is the time,

And not the king, that doth you injuries.

Yet for your part, it not appears to me

Either from the king or in the present time

That you should have an inch of any ground

To build a grief on: were you not restored

To all the Duke of Norfolk's signories,

Your noble and right well remember'd father's?

MOWBRAY

What thing, in honour, had my father lost,

That need to be revived and breathed in me?

The king that loved him, as the state stood then,

Was force perforce compell'd to banish him:

And then that Harry Bolingbroke and he,

Being mounted and both roused in their seats,

Their neighing coursers daring of the spur,

Their armed staves in charge, their beavers down,

Their eyes of fire sparking through sights of steel

And the loud trumpet blowing them together,

Then, then, when there was nothing could have stay'd

My father from the breast of Bolingbroke,

O when the king did throw his warder down,

His own life hung upon the staff he threw;

Then threw he down himself and all their lives

That by indictment and by dint of sword

Have since miscarried under Bolingbroke.

WESTMORELAND

You speak, Lord Mowbray, now you know not what.

The Earl of Hereford was reputed then

In England the most valiant gentlemen:

Who knows on whom fortune would then have smiled?

But if your father had been victor there,

He ne'er had borne it out of Coventry:

For all the country in a general voice

Cried hate upon him; and all their prayers and love

Were set on Hereford, whom they doted on

And bless'd and graced indeed, more than the king.

But this is mere digression from my purpose.

Here come I from our princely general

To know your griefs; to tell you from his grace

That he will give you audience; and wherein

It shall appear that your demands are just,

You shall enjoy them, every thing set off

That might so much as think you enemies.

MOWBRAY

But he hath forced us to compel this offer;

And it proceeds from policy, not love.

WESTMORELAND

Mowbray, you overween to take it so;

This offer comes from mercy, not from fear:

For, lo! within a ken our army lies,

Upon mine honour, all too confident

To give admittance to a thought of fear.

Our battle is more full of names than yours,

Our men more perfect in the use of arms,

Our armour all as strong, our cause the best;

Then reason will our heart should be as good

Say you not then our offer is compell'd.

MOWBRAY

Well, by my will we shall admit no parley.

WESTMORELAND

That argues but the shame of your offence:

A rotten case abides no handling.

HASTINGS

Hath the Prince John a full commission,

In very ample virtue of his father,

To hear and absolutely to determine

Of what conditions we shall stand upon?

WESTMORELAND

That is intended in the general's name:

I muse you make so slight a question.

ARCHBISHOP OF YORK

Then take, my Lord of Westmoreland, this schedule,

For this contains our general grievances:

Each several article herein redress'd,

All members of our cause, both here and hence,

That are insinew'd to this action,

Acquitted by a true substantial form

And present execution of our wills

To us and to our purposes confined,

We come within our awful banks again

And knit our powers to the arm of peace.

WESTMORELAND

This will I show the general. Please you, lords,

In sight of both our battles we may meet;

And either end in peace, which God so frame!

Or to the place of difference call the swords

Which must decide it.

ARCHBISHOP OF YORK

My lord, we will do so.

Exit WESTMORELAND

MOWBRAY

There is a thing within my bosom tells me

That no conditions of our peace can stand.

HASTINGS

Fear you not that: if we can make our peace

Upon such large terms and so absolute

As our conditions shall consist upon,

Our peace shall stand as firm as rocky mountains.

MOWBRAY

Yea, but our valuation shall be such

That every slight and false-derived cause,

Yea, every idle, nice and wanton reason

Shall to the king taste of this action;

That, were our royal faiths martyrs in love,

We shall be winnow'd with so rough a wind

That even our corn shall seem as light as chaff

And good from bad find no partition.

ARCHBISHOP OF YORK

No, no, my lord. Note this; the king is weary

Of dainty and such picking grievances:

For he hath found to end one doubt by death

Revives two greater in the heirs of life,

And therefore will he wipe his tables clean

And keep no tell-tale to his memory

That may repeat and history his loss

To new remembrance; for full well he knows

He cannot so precisely weed this land

As his misdoubts present occasion:

His foes are so enrooted with his friends

That, plucking to unfix an enemy,

He doth unfasten so and shake a friend:

So that this land, like an offensive wife

That hath enraged him on to offer strokes,

As he is striking, holds his infant up

And hangs resolved correction in the arm

That was uprear'd to execution.

HASTINGS

Besides, the king hath wasted all his rods

On late offenders, that he now doth lack

The very instruments of chastisement:

So that his power, like to a fangless lion,

May offer, but not hold.

ARCHBISHOP OF YORK

'Tis very true:

And therefore be assured, my good lord marshal,

If we do now make our atonement well,

Our peace will, like a broken limb united,

Grow stronger for the breaking.

MOWBRAY

Be it so.

Here is return'd my Lord of Westmoreland.

Re-enter WESTMORELAND

WESTMORELAND

The prince is here at hand: pleaseth your lordship

To meet his grace just distance 'tween our armies.

MOWBRAY

Your grace of York, in God's name then, set forward.

ARCHBISHOP OF YORK

Before, and greet his grace: my lord, we come.

Exeunt

SCENE 2

Another part of the forest.

Enter, from one side, MOWBRAY, attended; afterwards the ARCHBISHOP OF YORK, HASTINGS, and others: from the other side, Prince John of LANCASTER, and WESTMORELAND; Officers, and others with them

LANCASTER

You are well encounter'd here, my cousin Mowbray:

Good day to you, gentle lord archbishop;

And so to you, Lord Hastings, and to all.

My Lord of York, it better show'd with you

When that your flock, assembled by the bell,

Encircled you to hear with reverence

Your exposition on the holy text

Than now to see you here an iron man,

Cheering a rout of rebels with your drum,

Turning the word to sword and life to death.

That man that sits within a monarch's heart,

And ripens in the sunshine of his favour,

Would he abuse the countenance of the king,

Alack, what mischiefs might he set abrooch

In shadow of such greatness! With you, lord bishop,

It is even so. Who hath not heard it spoken

How deep you were within the books of God?

To us the speaker in his parliament;

To us the imagined voice of God himself;

The very opener and intelligencer

Between the grace, the sanctities of heaven

And our dull workings. O, who shall believe

But you misuse the reverence of your place,

Employ the countenance and grace of heaven,

As a false favourite doth his prince's name,

In deeds dishonourable? You have ta'en up,

Under the counterfeited zeal of God,

The subjects of his substitute, my father,

And both against the peace of heaven and him

Have here up-swarm'd them.

ARCHBISHOP OF YORK

Good my Lord of Lancaster,

I am not here against your father's peace;

But, as I told my lord of Westmoreland,

The time misorder'd doth, in common sense,

Crowd us and crush us to this monstrous form,

To hold our safety up. I sent your grace

The parcels and particulars of our grief,

The which hath been with scorn shoved from the court,

Whereon this Hydra son of war is born;

Whose dangerous eyes may well be charm'd asleep

With grant of our most just and right desires,

And true obedience, of this madness cured,

Stoop tamely to the foot of majesty.

MOWBRAY

If not, we ready are to try our fortunes

To the last man.

HASTINGS

And though we here fall down,

We have supplies to second our attempt:

If they miscarry, theirs shall second them;

And so success of mischief shall be born

And heir from heir shall hold this quarrel up

Whiles England shall have generation.

LANCASTER

You are too shallow, Hastings, much too shallow,

To sound the bottom of the after-times.

WESTMORELAND

Pleaseth your grace to answer them directly

How far forth you do like their articles.

LANCASTER

I like them all, and do allow them well,

And swear here, by the honour of my blood,

My father's purposes have been mistook,

And some about him have too lavishly

Wrested his meaning and authority.

My lord, these griefs shall be with speed redress'd;

Upon my soul, they shall. If this may please you,

Discharge your powers unto their several counties,

As we will ours: and here between the armies

Let's drink together friendly and embrace,

That all their eyes may bear those tokens home

Of our restored love and amity.

ARCHBISHOP OF YORK

I take your princely word for these redresses.

LANCASTER

I give it you, and will maintain my word:

And thereupon I drink unto your grace.

HASTINGS

Go, captain, and deliver to the army

This news of peace: let them have pay, and part:

I know it will well please them. Hie thee, captain.

Exit Officer

ARCHBISHOP OF YORK

To you, my noble Lord of Westmoreland.

WESTMORELAND

I pledge your grace; and, if you knew what pains

I have bestow'd to breed this present peace,

You would drink freely: but my love to ye

Shall show itself more openly hereafter.

ARCHBISHOP OF YORK

I do not doubt you.

WESTMORELAND

I am glad of it.

Health to my lord and gentle cousin, Mowbray.

MOWBRAY

You wish me health in very happy season;

For I am, on the sudden, something ill.

ARCHBISHOP OF YORK

Against ill chances men are ever merry;

But heaviness foreruns the good event.

WESTMORELAND

Therefore be merry, coz; since sudden sorrow

Serves to say thus, 'some good thing comes

to-morrow.'

ARCHBISHOP OF YORK

Believe me, I am passing light in spirit.

MOWBRAY

So much the worse, if your own rule be true.

Shouts within

LANCASTER

The word of peace is render'd: hark, how they shout!

MOWBRAY

This had been cheerful after victory.

ARCHBISHOP OF YORK

A peace is of the nature of a conquest;

For then both parties nobly are subdued,

And neither party loser.

LANCASTER

Go, my lord,

And let our army be discharged too.

Exit WESTMORELAND

And, good my lord, so please you, let our trains

March, by us, that we may peruse the men

We should have coped withal.

ARCHBISHOP OF YORK

Go, good Lord Hastings,

And, ere they be dismissed, let them march by.

Exit HASTINGS

LANCASTER

I trust, lords, we shall lie to-night together.

Re-enter WESTMORELAND

Now, cousin, wherefore stands our army still?

WESTMORELAND

The leaders, having charge from you to stand,

Will not go off until they hear you speak.

LANCASTER

They know their duties.

Re-enter HASTINGS

HASTINGS

My lord, our army is dispersed already;

Like youthful steers unyoked, they take their courses

East, west, north, south; or, like a school broke up,

Each hurries toward his home and sporting-place.

WESTMORELAND

Good tidings, my Lord Hastings; for the which

I do arrest thee, traitor, of high treason:

And you, lord archbishop, and you, Lord Mowbray,

Of capitol treason I attach you both.

MOWBRAY

Is this proceeding just and honourable?

WESTMORELAND

Is your assembly so?

ARCHBISHOP OF YORK

Will you thus break your faith?

LANCASTER

I pawn'd thee none:

I promised you redress of these same grievances

Whereof you did complain; which, by mine honour,

I will perform with a most Christian care.

But for you, rebels, look to taste the due

Meet for rebellion and such acts as yours.

Most shallowly did you these arms commence,

Fondly brought here and foolishly sent hence.

Strike up our drums, pursue the scatter'd stray:

God, and not we, hath safely fought to-day.

Some guard these traitors to the block of death,

Treason's true bed and yielder up of breath.

Exeunt

SCENE 3

Another part of the forest.

Alarum. Excursions. Enter FALSTAFF and COLEVILE, meeting

FALSTAFF

What's your name, sir? of what condition are you,

and of what place, I pray?

COLEVILE

I am a knight, sir, and my name is Colevile of the dale.

FALSTAFF

Well, then, Colevile is your name, a knight is your

degree, and your place the dale: Colevile shall be

still your name, a traitor your degree, and the

dungeon your place, a place deep enough; so shall

you be still Colevile of the dale.

COLEVILE

Are not you Sir John Falstaff?

FALSTAFF

As good a man as he, sir, whoe'er I am. Do ye

yield, sir? or shall I sweat for you? if I do

sweat, they are the drops of thy lovers, and they

weep for thy death: therefore rouse up fear and

trembling, and do observance to my mercy.

COLEVILE

I think you are Sir John Falstaff, and in that

thought yield me.

FALSTAFF

I have a whole school of tongues in this belly of

mine, and not a tongue of them all speaks any other

word but my name. An I had but a belly of any

indifference, I were simply the most active fellow

in Europe: my womb, my womb, my womb, undoes me.

Here comes our general.

Enter PRINCE JOHN OF LANCASTER, WESTMORELAND, BLUNT, and others

LANCASTER

The heat is past; follow no further now:

Call in the powers, good cousin Westmoreland.

Exit WESTMORELAND

Now, Falstaff, where have you been all this while?

When every thing is ended, then you come:

These tardy tricks of yours will, on my life,

One time or other break some gallows' back.

FALSTAFF

I would be sorry, my lord, but it should be thus: I

never knew yet but rebuke and cheque was the reward

of valour. Do you think me a swallow, an arrow, or a

bullet? have I, in my poor and old motion, the

expedition of thought? I have speeded hither with

the very extremest inch of possibility; I have

foundered nine score and odd posts: and here,

travel-tainted as I am, have in my pure and

immaculate valour, taken Sir John Colevile of the

dale, a most furious knight and valorous enemy.

But what of that? he saw me, and yielded; that I

may justly say, with the hook-nosed fellow of Rome,

'I came, saw, and overcame.'

LANCASTER

It was more of his courtesy than your deserving.

FALSTAFF

I know not: here he is, and here I yield him: and

I beseech your grace, let it be booked with the

rest of this day's deeds; or, by the Lord, I will

have it in a particular ballad else, with mine own

picture on the top on't, Colevile kissing my foot:

to the which course if I be enforced, if you do not

all show like gilt twopences to me, and I in the

clear sky of fame o'ershine you as much as the full

moon doth the cinders of the element, which show

like pins' heads to her, believe not the word of

the noble: therefore let me have right, and let

desert mount.

LANCASTER

Thine's too heavy to mount.

FALSTAFF

Let it shine, then.

LANCASTER

Thine's too thick to shine.

FALSTAFF

Let it do something, my good lord, that may do me

good, and call it what you will.

LANCASTER

Is thy name Colevile?

COLEVILE

It is, my lord.

LANCASTER

A famous rebel art thou, Colevile.

FALSTAFF

And a famous true subject took him.

COLEVILE

I am, my lord, but as my betters are

That led me hither: had they been ruled by me,

You should have won them dearer than you have.

FALSTAFF

I know not how they sold themselves: but thou, like

a kind fellow, gavest thyself away gratis; and I

thank thee for thee.

Re-enter WESTMORELAND

LANCASTER

Now, have you left pursuit?

WESTMORELAND

Retreat is made and execution stay'd.

LANCASTER

Send Colevile with his confederates

To York, to present execution:

Blunt, lead him hence; and see you guard him sure.

Exeunt BLUNT and others with COLEVILE

And now dispatch we toward the court, my lords:

I hear the king my father is sore sick:

Our news shall go before us to his majesty,

Which, cousin, you shall bear to comfort him,

And we with sober speed will follow you.

FALSTAFF

My lord, I beseech you, give me leave to go

Through Gloucestershire: and, when you come to court,

Stand my good lord, pray, in your good report.

LANCASTER

Fare you well, Falstaff: I, in my condition,

Shall better speak of you than you deserve.

Exeunt all but Falstaff

FALSTAFF

I would you had but the wit: 'twere better than

your dukedom. Good faith, this same young sober-

blooded boy doth not love me; nor a man cannot make

him laugh; but that's no marvel, he drinks no wine.

There's never none of these demure boys come to any

proof; for thin drink doth so over-cool their blood,

and making many fish-meals, that they fall into a

kind of male green-sickness; and then when they

marry, they get wenches: they are generally fools

and cowards; which some of us should be too, but for

inflammation. A good sherris sack hath a two-fold

operation in it. It ascends me into the brain;

dries me there all the foolish and dull and curdy

vapours which environ it; makes it apprehensive,

quick, forgetive, full of nimble fiery and

delectable shapes, which, delivered o'er to the

voice, the tongue, which is the birth, becomes

excellent wit. The second property of your

excellent sherris is, the warming of the blood;

which, before cold and settled, left the liver

white and pale, which is the badge of pusillanimity

and cowardice; but the sherris warms it and makes

it course from the inwards to the parts extreme:

it illumineth the face, which as a beacon gives

warning to all the rest of this little kingdom,

man, to arm; and then the vital commoners and

inland petty spirits muster me all to their captain,

the heart, who, great and puffed up with this

retinue, doth any deed of courage; and this valour

comes of sherris. So that skill in the weapon is

nothing without sack, for that sets it a-work; and

learning a mere hoard of gold kept by a devil, till

sack commences it and sets it in act and use.

Hereof comes it that Prince Harry is valiant; for

the cold blood he did naturally inherit of his

father, he hath, like lean, sterile and bare land,

manured, husbanded and tilled with excellent

endeavour of drinking good and good store of fertile

sherris, that he is become very hot and valiant. If

I had a thousand sons, the first humane principle I

would teach them should be, to forswear thin

potations and to addict themselves to sack.

Enter BARDOLPH

How now Bardolph?

BARDOLPH

The army is discharged all and gone.

FALSTAFF

Let them go. I'll through Gloucestershire; and

there will I visit Master Robert Shallow, esquire:

I have him already tempering between my finger and

my thumb, and shortly will I seal with him. Come away.

Exeunt

SCENE 4

Westminster. The Jerusalem Chamber.

Enter KING HENRY IV, the Princes Thomas of CLARENCE and Humphrey of GLOUCESTER, WARWICK, and others

KING HENRY IV

Now, lords, if God doth give successful end

To this debate that bleedeth at our doors,

We will our youth lead on to higher fields

And draw no swords but what are sanctified.

Our navy is address'd, our power collected,

Our substitutes in absence well invested,

And every thing lies level to our wish:

Only, we want a little personal strength;

And pause us, till these rebels, now afoot,

Come underneath the yoke of government.

WARWICK

Both which we doubt not but your majesty

Shall soon enjoy.

KING HENRY IV

Humphrey, my son of Gloucester,

Where is the prince your brother?

GLOUCESTER

I think he's gone to hunt, my lord, at Windsor.

KING HENRY IV

And how accompanied?

GLOUCESTER

I do not know, my lord.

KING HENRY IV

Is not his brother, Thomas of Clarence, with him?

GLOUCESTER

No, my good lord; he is in presence here.

CLARENCE

What would my lord and father?

KING HENRY IV

Nothing but well to thee, Thomas of Clarence.

How chance thou art not with the prince thy brother?

He loves thee, and thou dost neglect him, Thomas;

Thou hast a better place in his affection

Than all thy brothers: cherish it, my boy,

And noble offices thou mayst effect

Of mediation, after I am dead,

Between his greatness and thy other brethren:

Therefore omit him not; blunt not his love,

Nor lose the good advantage of his grace

By seeming cold or careless of his will;

For he is gracious, if he be observed:

He hath a tear for pity and a hand

Open as day for melting charity:

Yet notwithstanding, being incensed, he's flint,

As humorous as winter and as sudden

As flaws congealed in the spring of day.

His temper, therefore, must be well observed:

Chide him for faults, and do it reverently,

When thou perceive his blood inclined to mirth;

But, being moody, give him line and scope,

Till that his passions, like a whale on ground,

Confound themselves with working. Learn this, Thomas,

And thou shalt prove a shelter to thy friends,

A hoop of gold to bind thy brothers in,

That the united vessel of their blood,

Mingled with venom of suggestion--

As, force perforce, the age will pour it in--

Shall never leak, though it do work as strong

As aconitum or rash gunpowder.

CLARENCE

I shall observe him with all care and love.

KING HENRY IV

Why art thou not at Windsor with him, Thomas?

CLARENCE

He is not there to-day; he dines in London.

KING HENRY IV

And how accompanied? canst thou tell that?

CLARENCE

With Poins, and other his continual followers.

KING HENRY IV

Most subject is the fattest soil to weeds;

And he, the noble image of my youth,

Is overspread with them: therefore my grief

Stretches itself beyond the hour of death:

The blood weeps from my heart when I do shape

In forms imaginary the unguided days

And rotten times that you shall look upon

When I am sleeping with my ancestors.

For when his headstrong riot hath no curb,

When rage and hot blood are his counsellors,

When means and lavish manners meet together,

O, with what wings shall his affections fly

Towards fronting peril and opposed decay!

WARWICK

My gracious lord, you look beyond him quite:

The prince but studies his companions

Like a strange tongue, wherein, to gain the language,

'Tis needful that the most immodest word

Be look'd upon and learn'd; which once attain'd,

Your highness knows, comes to no further use

But to be known and hated. So, like gross terms,

The prince will in the perfectness of time

Cast off his followers; and their memory

Shall as a pattern or a measure live,

By which his grace must mete the lives of others,

Turning past evils to advantages.

KING HENRY IV

'Tis seldom when the bee doth leave her comb

In the dead carrion.

Enter WESTMORELAND

Who's here? Westmoreland?

WESTMORELAND

Health to my sovereign, and new happiness

Added to that that I am to deliver!

Prince John your son doth kiss your grace's hand:

Mowbray, the Bishop Scroop, Hastings and all

Are brought to the correction of your law;

There is not now a rebel's sword unsheath'd

But peace puts forth her olive every where.

The manner how this action hath been borne

Here at more leisure may your highness read,

With every course in his particular.

KING HENRY IV

O Westmoreland, thou art a summer bird,

Which ever in the haunch of winter sings

The lifting up of day.

Enter HARCOURT

Look, here's more news.

HARCOURT

From enemies heaven keep your majesty;

And, when they stand against you, may they fall

As those that I am come to tell you of!

The Earl Northumberland and the Lord Bardolph,

With a great power of English and of Scots

Are by the sheriff of Yorkshire overthrown:

The manner and true order of the fight

This packet, please it you, contains at large.

KING HENRY IV

And wherefore should these good news make me sick?

Will fortune never come with both hands full,

But write her fair words still in foulest letters?

She either gives a stomach and no food;

Such are the poor, in health; or else a feast

And takes away the stomach; such are the rich,

That have abundance and enjoy it not.

I should rejoice now at this happy news;

And now my sight fails, and my brain is giddy:

O me! come near me; now I am much ill.

GLOUCESTER

Comfort, your majesty!

CLARENCE

O my royal father!

WESTMORELAND

My sovereign lord, cheer up yourself, look up.

WARWICK

Be patient, princes; you do know, these fits

Are with his highness very ordinary.

Stand from him. Give him air; he'll straight be well.

CLARENCE

No, no, he cannot long hold out these pangs:

The incessant care and labour of his mind

Hath wrought the mure that should confine it in

So thin that life looks through and will break out.

GLOUCESTER

The people fear me; for they do observe

Unfather'd heirs and loathly births of nature:

The seasons change their manners, as the year

Had found some months asleep and leap'd them over.

CLARENCE

The river hath thrice flow'd, no ebb between;

And the old folk, time's doting chronicles,

Say it did so a little time before

That our great-grandsire, Edward, sick'd and died.

WARWICK

Speak lower, princes, for the king recovers.

GLOUCESTER

This apoplexy will certain be his end.

KING HENRY IV

I pray you, take me up, and bear me hence

Into some other chamber: softly, pray.

SCENE 5

Another chamber.

KING HENRY IV lying on a bed: CLARENCE, GLOUCESTER, WARWICK, and others in attendance

KING HENRY IV

Let there be no noise made, my gentle friends;

Unless some dull and favourable hand

Will whisper music to my weary spirit.

WARWICK

Call for the music in the other room.

KING HENRY IV

Set me the crown upon my pillow here.

CLARENCE

His eye is hollow, and he changes much.

WARWICK

Less noise, less noise!

Enter PRINCE HENRY

PRINCE HENRY

Who saw the Duke of Clarence?

CLARENCE

I am here, brother, full of heaviness.

PRINCE HENRY

How now! rain within doors, and none abroad!

How doth the king?

GLOUCESTER

Exceeding ill.

PRINCE HENRY

Heard he the good news yet?

Tell it him.

GLOUCESTER

He alter'd much upon the hearing it.

PRINCE HENRY

If he be sick with joy, he'll recover without physic.

WARWICK

Not so much noise, my lords: sweet prince,

speak low;

The king your father is disposed to sleep.

CLARENCE

Let us withdraw into the other room.

WARWICK

Will't please your grace to go along with us?

PRINCE HENRY

No; I will sit and watch here by the king.

Exeunt all but PRINCE HENRY

Why doth the crown lie there upon his pillow,

Being so troublesome a bedfellow?

O polish'd perturbation! golden care!

That keep'st the ports of slumber open wide

To many a watchful night! sleep with it now!

Yet not so sound and half so deeply sweet

As he whose brow with homely biggen bound

Snores out the watch of night. O majesty!

When thou dost pinch thy bearer, thou dost sit

Like a rich armour worn in heat of day,

That scalds with safety. By his gates of breath

There lies a downy feather which stirs not:

Did he suspire, that light and weightless down

Perforce must move. My gracious lord! my father!

This sleep is sound indeed, this is a sleep

That from this golden rigol hath divorced

So many English kings. Thy due from me

Is tears and heavy sorrows of the blood,

Which nature, love, and filial tenderness,

Shall, O dear father, pay thee plenteously:

My due from thee is this imperial crown,

Which, as immediate as thy place and blood,

Derives itself to me. Lo, here it sits,

Which God shall guard: and put the world's whole strength

Into one giant arm, it shall not force

This lineal honour from me: this from thee

Will I to mine leave, as 'tis left to me.

Exit

KING HENRY IV

Warwick! Gloucester! Clarence!

Re-enter WARWICK, GLOUCESTER, CLARENCE, and the rest

CLARENCE

Doth the king call?

WARWICK

What would your majesty? How fares your grace?

KING HENRY IV

Why did you leave me here alone, my lords?

CLARENCE

We left the prince my brother here, my liege,

Who undertook to sit and watch by you.

KING HENRY IV

The Prince of Wales! Where is he? let me see him:

He is not here.

WARWICK

This door is open; he is gone this way.

GLOUCESTER

He came not through the chamber where we stay'd.

KING HENRY IV

Where is the crown? who took it from my pillow?

WARWICK

When we withdrew, my liege, we left it here.

KING HENRY IV

The prince hath ta'en it hence: go, seek him out.

Is he so hasty that he doth suppose

My sleep my death?

Find him, my Lord of Warwick; chide him hither.

Exit WARWICK

This part of his conjoins with my disease,

And helps to end me. See, sons, what things you are!

How quickly nature falls into revolt

When gold becomes her object!

For this the foolish over-careful fathers

Have broke their sleep with thoughts, their brains with care,

Their bones with industry;

For this they have engrossed and piled up

The canker'd heaps of strange-achieved gold;

For this they have been thoughtful to invest

Their sons with arts and martial exercises:

When, like the bee, culling from every flower

The virtuous sweets,

Our thighs pack'd with wax, our mouths with honey,

We bring it to the hive, and, like the bees,

Are murdered for our pains. This bitter taste

Yield his engrossments to the ending father.

Re-enter WARWICK

Now, where is he that will not stay so long

Till his friend sickness hath determined me?

WARWICK

My lord, I found the prince in the next room,

Washing with kindly tears his gentle cheeks,

With such a deep demeanor in great sorrow

That tyranny, which never quaff'd but blood,

Would, by beholding him, have wash'd his knife

With gentle eye-drops. He is coming hither.

KING HENRY IV

But wherefore did he take away the crown?

Re-enter PRINCE HENRY

Lo, where he comes. Come hither to me, Harry.

Depart the chamber, leave us here alone.

Exeunt WARWICK and the rest

PRINCE HENRY

I never thought to hear you speak again.

KING HENRY IV

Thy wish was father, Harry, to that thought:

I stay too long by thee, I weary thee.

Dost thou so hunger for mine empty chair

That thou wilt needs invest thee with my honours

Before thy hour be ripe? O foolish youth!

Thou seek'st the greatness that will o'erwhelm thee.

Stay but a little; for my cloud of dignity

Is held from falling with so weak a wind

That it will quickly drop: my day is dim.

Thou hast stolen that which after some few hours

Were thine without offence; and at my death

Thou hast seal'd up my expectation:

Thy life did manifest thou lovedst me not,

And thou wilt have me die assured of it.

Thou hidest a thousand daggers in thy thoughts,

Which thou hast whetted on thy stony heart,

To stab at half an hour of my life.

What! canst thou not forbear me half an hour?

Then get thee gone and dig my grave thyself,

And bid the merry bells ring to thine ear

That thou art crowned, not that I am dead.

Let all the tears that should bedew my hearse

Be drops of balm to sanctify thy head:

Only compound me with forgotten dust

Give that which gave thee life unto the worms.

Pluck down my officers, break my decrees;

For now a time is come to mock at form:

Harry the Fifth is crown'd: up, vanity!

Down, royal state! all you sage counsellors, hence!

And to the English court assemble now,

From every region, apes of idleness!

Now, neighbour confines, purge you of your scum:

Have you a ruffian that will swear, drink, dance,

Revel the night, rob, murder, and commit

The oldest sins the newest kind of ways?

Be happy, he will trouble you no more;

England shall double gild his treble guilt,

England shall give him office, honour, might;

For the fifth Harry from curb'd licence plucks

The muzzle of restraint, and the wild dog

Shall flesh his tooth on every innocent.

O my poor kingdom, sick with civil blows!

When that my care could not withhold thy riots,

What wilt thou do when riot is thy care?

O, thou wilt be a wilderness again,

Peopled with wolves, thy old inhabitants!

PRINCE HENRY

O, pardon me, my liege! but for my tears,

The moist impediments unto my speech,

I had forestall'd this dear and deep rebuke

Ere you with grief had spoke and I had heard

The course of it so far. There is your crown;

And He that wears the crown immortally

Long guard it yours! If I affect it more

Than as your honour and as your renown,

Let me no more from this obedience rise,

Which my most inward true and duteous spirit

Teacheth, this prostrate and exterior bending.

God witness with me, when I here came in,

And found no course of breath within your majesty,

How cold it struck my heart! If I do feign,

O, let me in my present wildness die

And never live to show the incredulous world

The noble change that I have purposed!

Coming to look on you, thinking you dead,

And dead almost, my liege, to think you were,

I spake unto this crown as having sense,

And thus upbraided it: 'The care on thee depending

Hath fed upon the body of my father;

Therefore, thou best of gold art worst of gold:

Other, less fine in carat, is more precious,

Preserving life in medicine potable;

But thou, most fine, most honour'd: most renown'd,

Hast eat thy bearer up.' Thus, my most royal liege,

Accusing it, I put it on my head,

To try with it, as with an enemy

That had before my face murder'd my father,

The quarrel of a true inheritor.

But if it did infect my blood with joy,

Or swell my thoughts to any strain of pride;

If any rebel or vain spirit of mine

Did with the least affection of a welcome

Give entertainment to the might of it,

Let God for ever keep it from my head

And make me as the poorest vassal is

That doth with awe and terror kneel to it!

KING HENRY IV

O my son,

God put it in thy mind to take it hence,

That thou mightst win the more thy father's love,

Pleading so wisely in excuse of it!

Come hither, Harry, sit thou by my bed;

And hear, I think, the very latest counsel

That ever I shall breathe. God knows, my son,

By what by-paths and indirect crook'd ways

I met this crown; and I myself know well

How troublesome it sat upon my head.

To thee it shall descend with bitter quiet,

Better opinion, better confirmation;

For all the soil of the achievement goes

With me into the earth. It seem'd in me

But as an honour snatch'd with boisterous hand,

And I had many living to upbraid

My gain of it by their assistances;

Which daily grew to quarrel and to bloodshed,

Wounding supposed peace: all these bold fears

Thou see'st with peril I have answered;

For all my reign hath been but as a scene

Acting that argument: and now my death

Changes the mode; for what in me was purchased,

Falls upon thee in a more fairer sort;

So thou the garland wear'st successively.

Yet, though thou stand'st more sure than I could do,

Thou art not firm enough, since griefs are green;

And all my friends, which thou must make thy friends,

Have but their stings and teeth newly ta'en out;

By whose fell working I was first advanced

And by whose power I well might lodge a fear

To be again displaced: which to avoid,

I cut them off; and had a purpose now

To lead out many to the Holy Land,

Lest rest and lying still might make them look

Too near unto my state. Therefore, my Harry,

Be it thy course to busy giddy minds

With foreign quarrels; that action, hence borne out,

May waste the memory of the former days.

More would I, but my lungs are wasted so

That strength of speech is utterly denied me.

How I came by the crown, O God forgive;

And grant it may with thee in true peace live!

PRINCE HENRY

My gracious liege,

You won it, wore it, kept it, gave it me;

Then plain and right must my possession be:

Which I with more than with a common pain

'Gainst all the world will rightfully maintain.

Enter Lord John of LANCASTER

KING HENRY IV

Look, look, here comes my John of Lancaster.

LANCASTER

Health, peace, and happiness to my royal father!

KING HENRY IV

Thou bring'st me happiness and peace, son John;

But health, alack, with youthful wings is flown

From this bare wither'd trunk: upon thy sight

My worldly business makes a period.

Where is my Lord of Warwick?

PRINCE HENRY

My Lord of Warwick!

Enter WARWICK, and others

KING HENRY IV

Doth any name particular belong

Unto the lodging where I first did swoon?

WARWICK

'Tis call'd Jerusalem, my noble lord.

KING HENRY IV

Laud be to God! even there my life must end.

It hath been prophesied to me many years,

I should not die but in Jerusalem;

Which vainly I supposed the Holy Land:

But bear me to that chamber; there I'll lie;

In that Jerusalem shall Harry die.

Exeunt

ACT 5

SCENE 1

Gloucestershire. SHALLOW'S house.

Enter SHALLOW, FALSTAFF, BARDOLPH, and Page

SHALLOW

By cock and pie, sir, you shall not away to-night.

What, Davy, I say!

FALSTAFF

You must excuse me, Master Robert Shallow.

SHALLOW

I will not excuse you; you shall not be excused;

excuses shall not be admitted; there is no excuse

shall serve; you shall not be excused. Why, Davy!

Enter DAVY

DAVY

Here, sir.

SHALLOW

Davy, Davy, Davy, Davy, let me see, Davy; let me

see, Davy; let me see: yea, marry, William cook,

bid him come hither. Sir John, you shall not be excused.

DAVY

Marry, sir, thus; those precepts cannot be served:

and, again, sir, shall we sow the headland with wheat?

SHALLOW

With red wheat, Davy. But for William cook: are

there no young pigeons?

DAVY

Yes, sir. Here is now the smith's note for shoeing

and plough-irons.

SHALLOW

Let it be cast and paid. Sir John, you shall not be excused.

DAVY

Now, sir, a new link to the bucket must need be

had: and, sir, do you mean to stop any of William's

wages, about the sack he lost the other day at

Hinckley fair?

SHALLOW

A' shall answer it. Some pigeons, Davy, a couple

of short-legged hens, a joint of mutton, and any

pretty little tiny kickshaws, tell William cook.

DAVY

Doth the man of war stay all night, sir?

SHALLOW

Yea, Davy. I will use him well: a friend i' the

court is better than a penny in purse. Use his men

well, Davy; for they are arrant knaves, and will backbite.

DAVY

No worse than they are backbitten, sir; for they

have marvellous foul linen.

SHALLOW

Well conceited, Davy: about thy business, Davy.

DAVY

I beseech you, sir, to countenance William Visor of

Woncot against Clement Perkes of the hill.

SHALLOW

There is many complaints, Davy, against that Visor:

that Visor is an arrant knave, on my knowledge.

DAVY

I grant your worship that he is a knave, sir; but

yet, God forbid, sir, but a knave should have some

countenance at his friend's request. An honest

man, sir, is able to speak for himself, when a knave

is not. I have served your worship truly, sir,

this eight years; and if I cannot once or twice in

a quarter bear out a knave against an honest man, I

have but a very little credit with your worship. The

knave is mine honest friend, sir; therefore, I

beseech your worship, let him be countenanced.

SHALLOW

Go to; I say he shall have no wrong. Look about, Davy.

Exit DAVY

Where are you, Sir John? Come, come, come, off

with your boots. Give me your hand, Master Bardolph.

BARDOLPH

I am glad to see your worship.

SHALLOW

I thank thee with all my heart, kind

Master Bardolph: and welcome, my tall fellow.

To the Page

Come, Sir John.

FALSTAFF

I'll follow you, good Master Robert Shallow.

Exit SHALLOW

Bardolph, look to our horses.

Exeunt BARDOLPH and Page

If I were sawed into quantities, I should make four

dozen of such bearded hermits' staves as Master

Shallow. It is a wonderful thing to see the

semblable coherence of his men's spirits and his:

they, by observing of him, do bear themselves like

foolish justices; he, by conversing with them, is

turned into a justice-like serving-man: their

spirits are so married in conjunction with the

participation of society that they flock together in

consent, like so many wild-geese. If I had a suit

to Master Shallow, I would humour his men with the

imputation of being near their master: if to his

men, I would curry with Master Shallow that no man

could better command his servants. It is certain

that either wise bearing or ignorant carriage is

caught, as men take diseases, one of another:

therefore let men take heed of their company. I

will devise matter enough out of this Shallow to

keep Prince Harry in continual laughter the wearing

out of six fashions, which is four terms, or two

actions, and a' shall laugh without intervallums. O,

it is much that a lie with a slight oath and a jest

with a sad brow will do with a fellow that never

had the ache in his shoulders! O, you shall see him

laugh till his face be like a wet cloak ill laid up!

SHALLOW

[Within] Sir John!

FALSTAFF

I come, Master Shallow; I come, Master Shallow.

Exit

SCENE 2

Westminster. The palace.

Enter WARWICK and the Lord Chief-Justice, meeting

WARWICK

How now, my lord chief-justice! whither away?

Lord Chief-Justice How doth the king?

WARWICK

Exceeding well; his cares are now all ended.

Lord Chief-Justice I hope, not dead.

WARWICK

He's walk'd the way of nature;

And to our purposes he lives no more.

Lord Chief-Justice I would his majesty had call'd me with him:

The service that I truly did his life

Hath left me open to all injuries.

WARWICK

Indeed I think the young king loves you not.

Lord Chief-Justice I know he doth not, and do arm myself

To welcome the condition of the time,

Which cannot look more hideously upon me

Than I have drawn it in my fantasy.

Enter LANCASTER, CLARENCE, GLOUCESTER, WESTMORELAND, and others

WARWICK

Here come the heavy issue of dead Harry:

O that the living Harry had the temper

Of him, the worst of these three gentlemen!

How many nobles then should hold their places

That must strike sail to spirits of vile sort!

Lord Chief-Justice O God, I fear all will be overturn'd!

LANCASTER

Good morrow, cousin Warwick, good morrow.

GLOUCESTER CLARENCE

Good morrow, cousin.

LANCASTER

We meet like men that had forgot to speak.

WARWICK

We do remember; but our argument

Is all too heavy to admit much talk.

LANCASTER

Well, peace be with him that hath made us heavy.

Lord Chief-Justice Peace be with us, lest we be heavier!

GLOUCESTER

O, good my lord, you have lost a friend indeed;

And I dare swear you borrow not that face

Of seeming sorrow, it is sure your own.

LANCASTER

Though no man be assured what grace to find,

You stand in coldest expectation:

I am the sorrier; would 'twere otherwise.

CLARENCE

Well, you must now speak Sir John Falstaff fair;

Which swims against your stream of quality.

Lord Chief-Justice Sweet princes, what I did, I did in honour,

Led by the impartial conduct of my soul:

And never shall you see that I will beg

A ragged and forestall'd remission.

If truth and upright innocency fail me,

I'll to the king my master that is dead,

And tell him who hath sent me after him.

WARWICK

Here comes the prince.

Enter KING HENRY V, attended

Lord Chief-Justice Good morrow; and God save your majesty!

KING HENRY V

This new and gorgeous garment, majesty,

Sits not so easy on me as you think.

Brothers, you mix your sadness with some fear:

This is the English, not the Turkish court;

Not Amurath an Amurath succeeds,

But Harry Harry. Yet be sad, good brothers,

For, by my faith, it very well becomes you:

Sorrow so royally in you appears

That I will deeply put the fashion on

And wear it in my heart: why then, be sad;

But entertain no more of it, good brothers,

Than a joint burden laid upon us all.

For me, by heaven, I bid you be assured,

I'll be your father and your brother too;

Let me but bear your love, I 'll bear your cares:

Yet weep that Harry's dead; and so will I;

But Harry lives, that shall convert those tears

By number into hours of happiness.

Princes

We hope no other from your majesty.

KING HENRY V

You all look strangely on me: and you most;

You are, I think, assured I love you not.

Lord Chief-Justice I am assured, if I be measured rightly,

Your majesty hath no just cause to hate me.

KING HENRY V

No!

How might a prince of my great hopes forget

So great indignities you laid upon me?

What! rate, rebuke, and roughly send to prison

The immediate heir of England! Was this easy?

May this be wash'd in Lethe, and forgotten?

Lord Chief-Justice I then did use the person of your father;

The image of his power lay then in me:

And, in the administration of his law,

Whiles I was busy for the commonwealth,

Your highness pleased to forget my place,

The majesty and power of law and justice,

The image of the king whom I presented,

And struck me in my very seat of judgment;

Whereon, as an offender to your father,

I gave bold way to my authority

And did commit you. If the deed were ill,

Be you contented, wearing now the garland,

To have a son set your decrees at nought,

To pluck down justice from your awful bench,

To trip the course of law and blunt the sword

That guards the peace and safety of your person;

Nay, more, to spurn at your most royal image

And mock your workings in a second body.

Question your royal thoughts, make the case yours;

Be now the father and propose a son,

Hear your own dignity so much profaned,

See your most dreadful laws so loosely slighted,

Behold yourself so by a son disdain'd;

And then imagine me taking your part

And in your power soft silencing your son:

After this cold considerance, sentence me;

And, as you are a king, speak in your state

What I have done that misbecame my place,

My person, or my liege's sovereignty.

KING HENRY V

You are right, justice, and you weigh this well;

Therefore still bear the balance and the sword:

And I do wish your honours may increase,

Till you do live to see a son of mine

Offend you and obey you, as I did.

So shall I live to speak my father's words:

'Happy am I, that have a man so bold,

That dares do justice on my proper son;

And not less happy, having such a son,

That would deliver up his greatness so

Into the hands of justice.' You did commit me:

For which, I do commit into your hand

The unstained sword that you have used to bear;

With this remembrance, that you use the same

With the like bold, just and impartial spirit

As you have done 'gainst me. There is my hand.

You shall be as a father to my youth:

My voice shall sound as you do prompt mine ear,

And I will stoop and humble my intents

To your well-practised wise directions.

And, princes all, believe me, I beseech you;

My father is gone wild into his grave,

For in his tomb lie my affections;

And with his spirit sadly I survive,

To mock the expectation of the world,

To frustrate prophecies and to raze out

Rotten opinion, who hath writ me down

After my seeming. The tide of blood in me

Hath proudly flow'd in vanity till now:

Now doth it turn and ebb back to the sea,

Where it shall mingle with the state of floods

And flow henceforth in formal majesty.

Now call we our high court of parliament:

And let us choose such limbs of noble counsel,

That the great body of our state may go

In equal rank with the best govern'd nation;

That war, or peace, or both at once, may be

As things acquainted and familiar to us;

In which you, father, shall have foremost hand.

Our coronation done, we will accite,

As I before remember'd, all our state:

And, God consigning to my good intents,

No prince nor peer shall have just cause to say,

God shorten Harry's happy life one day!

Exeunt

SCENE 3

Gloucestershire. SHALLOW'S orchard.

Enter FALSTAFF, SHALLOW, SILENCE, DAVY, BARDOLPH, and the Page

SHALLOW

Nay, you shall see my orchard, where, in an arbour,

we will eat a last year's pippin of my own graffing,

with a dish of caraways, and so forth: come,

cousin Silence: and then to bed.

FALSTAFF

'Fore God, you have here a goodly dwelling and a rich.

SHALLOW

Barren, barren, barren; beggars all, beggars all,

Sir John: marry, good air. Spread, Davy; spread,

Davy; well said, Davy.

FALSTAFF

This Davy serves you for good uses; he is your

serving-man and your husband.

SHALLOW

A good varlet, a good varlet, a very good varlet,

Sir John: by the mass, I have drunk too much sack

at supper: a good varlet. Now sit down, now sit

down: come, cousin.

SILENCE

Ah, sirrah! quoth-a, we shall

Do nothing but eat, and make good cheer,

Singing

And praise God for the merry year;

When flesh is cheap and females dear,

And lusty lads roam here and there

So merrily,

And ever among so merrily.

FALSTAFF

There's a merry heart! Good Master Silence, I'll

give you a health for that anon.

SHALLOW

Give Master Bardolph some wine, Davy.

DAVY

Sweet sir, sit; I'll be with you anon. most sweet

sir, sit. Master page, good master page, sit.

Proface! What you want in meat, we'll have in drink:

but you must bear; the heart's all.

Exit

SHALLOW

Be merry, Master Bardolph; and, my little soldier

there, be merry.

SILENCE

Be merry, be merry, my wife has all;

Singing

For women are shrews, both short and tall:

'Tis merry in hall when beards wag all,

And welcome merry Shrove-tide.

Be merry, be merry.

FALSTAFF

I did not think Master Silence had been a man of

this mettle.

SILENCE

Who, I? I have been merry twice and once ere now.

Re-enter DAVY

DAVY

There's a dish of leather-coats for you.

To BARDOLPH

SHALLOW

Davy!

DAVY

Your worship! I'll be with you straight.

To BARDOLPH

A cup of wine, sir?

SILENCE

A cup of wine that's brisk and fine,

Singing

And drink unto the leman mine;

And a merry heart lives long-a.

FALSTAFF

Well said, Master Silence.

SILENCE

An we shall be merry, now comes in the sweet o' the night.

FALSTAFF

Health and long life to you, Master Silence.

SILENCE

Fill the cup, and let it come;

Singing

I'll pledge you a mile to the bottom.

SHALLOW

Honest Bardolph, welcome: if thou wantest any

thing, and wilt not call, beshrew thy heart.

Welcome, my little tiny thief.

To the Page

And welcome indeed too. I'll drink to Master

Bardolph, and to all the cavaleros about London.

DAVY

I hove to see London once ere I die.

BARDOLPH

An I might see you there, Davy,--

SHALLOW

By the mass, you'll crack a quart together, ha!

Will you not, Master Bardolph?

BARDOLPH

Yea, sir, in a pottle-pot.

SHALLOW

By God's liggens, I thank thee: the knave will

stick by thee, I can assure thee that. A' will not

out; he is true bred.

BARDOLPH

And I'll stick by him, sir.

SHALLOW

Why, there spoke a king. Lack nothing: be merry.

Knocking within

Look who's at door there, ho! who knocks?

Exit DAVY

FALSTAFF

Why, now you have done me right.

To SILENCE, seeing him take off a bumper

SILENCE

[Singing]

Do me right,

And dub me knight: Samingo.

Is't not so?

FALSTAFF

'Tis so.

SILENCE

Is't so? Why then, say an old man can do somewhat.

Re-enter DAVY

DAVY

An't please your worship, there's one Pistol come

from the court with news.

FALSTAFF

From the court! let him come in.

Enter PISTOL

How now, Pistol!

PISTOL

Sir John, God save you!

FALSTAFF

What wind blew you hither, Pistol?

PISTOL

Not the ill wind which blows no man to good. Sweet

knight, thou art now one of the greatest men in this realm.

SILENCE

By'r lady, I think a' be, but goodman Puff of Barson.

PISTOL

Puff!

Puff in thy teeth, most recreant coward base!

Sir John, I am thy Pistol and thy friend,

And helter-skelter have I rode to thee,

And tidings do I bring and lucky joys

And golden times and happy news of price.

FALSTAFF

I pray thee now, deliver them like a man of this world.

PISTOL

A foutre for the world and worldlings base!

I speak of Africa and golden joys.

FALSTAFF

O base Assyrian knight, what is thy news?

Let King Cophetua know the truth thereof.

SILENCE

And Robin Hood, Scarlet, and John.

Singing

PISTOL

Shall dunghill curs confront the Helicons?

And shall good news be baffled?

Then, Pistol, lay thy head in Furies' lap.

SILENCE

Honest gentleman, I know not your breeding.

PISTOL

Why then, lament therefore.

SHALLOW

Give me pardon, sir: if, sir, you come with news

from the court, I take it there's but two ways,

either to utter them, or to conceal them. I am,

sir, under the king, in some authority.

PISTOL

Under which king, Besonian? speak, or die.

SHALLOW

Under King Harry.

PISTOL

Harry the Fourth? or Fifth?

SHALLOW

Harry the Fourth.

PISTOL

A foutre for thine office!

Sir John, thy tender lambkin now is king;

Harry the Fifth's the man. I speak the truth:

When Pistol lies, do this; and fig me, like

The bragging Spaniard.

FALSTAFF

What, is the old king dead?

PISTOL

As nail in door: the things I speak are just.

FALSTAFF

Away, Bardolph! saddle my horse. Master Robert

Shallow, choose what office thou wilt in the land,

'tis thine. Pistol, I will double-charge thee with dignities.

BARDOLPH

O joyful day!

I would not take a knighthood for my fortune.

PISTOL

What! I do bring good news.

FALSTAFF

Carry Master Silence to bed. Master Shallow, my

Lord Shallow,--be what thou wilt; I am fortune's

steward--get on thy boots: we'll ride all night.

O sweet Pistol! Away, Bardolph!

Exit BARDOLPH

Come, Pistol, utter more to me; and withal devise

something to do thyself good. Boot, boot, Master

Shallow: I know the young king is sick for me. Let

us take any man's horses; the laws of England are at

my commandment. Blessed are they that have been my

friends; and woe to my lord chief-justice!

PISTOL

Let vultures vile seize on his lungs also!

'Where is the life that late I led?' say they:

Why, here it is; welcome these pleasant days!

Exeunt

SCENE 4

London. A street.

Enter Beadles, dragging in HOSTESS QUICKLY and DOLL TEARSHEET

MISTRESS QUICKLY

No, thou arrant knave; I would to God that I might

die, that I might have thee hanged: thou hast

drawn my shoulder out of joint.

First Beadle

The constables have delivered her over to me; and

she shall have whipping-cheer enough, I warrant

her: there hath been a man or two lately killed about her.

DOLL TEARSHEET

Nut-hook, nut-hook, you lie. Come on; I 'll tell

thee what, thou damned tripe-visaged rascal, an

the child I now go with do miscarry, thou wert

better thou hadst struck thy mother, thou

paper-faced villain.

MISTRESS QUICKLY

O the Lord, that Sir John were come! he would make

this a bloody day to somebody. But I pray God the

fruit of her womb miscarry!

First Beadle

If it do, you shall have a dozen of cushions again;

you have but eleven now. Come, I charge you both go

with me; for the man is dead that you and Pistol

beat amongst you.

DOLL TEARSHEET

I'll tell you what, you thin man in a censer, I

will have you as soundly swinged for this,--you

blue-bottle rogue, you filthy famished correctioner,

if you be not swinged, I'll forswear half-kirtles.

First Beadle

Come, come, you she knight-errant, come.

MISTRESS QUICKLY

O God, that right should thus overcome might!

Well, of sufferance comes ease.

DOLL TEARSHEET

Come, you rogue, come; bring me to a justice.

MISTRESS QUICKLY

Ay, come, you starved blood-hound.

DOLL TEARSHEET

Goodman death, goodman bones!

MISTRESS QUICKLY

Thou atomy, thou!

DOLL TEARSHEET

Come, you thin thing; come you rascal.

First Beadle

Very well.

Exeunt

SCENE 5

A public place near Westminster Abbey.

Enter two Grooms, strewing rushes

First Groom

More rushes, more rushes.

Second Groom

The trumpets have sounded twice.

First Groom

'Twill be two o'clock ere they come from the

coronation: dispatch, dispatch.

Exeunt

Enter FALSTAFF, SHALLOW, PISTOL, BARDOLPH, and Page

FALSTAFF

Stand here by me, Master Robert Shallow; I will

make the king do you grace: I will leer upon him as

a' comes by; and do but mark the countenance that he

will give me.

PISTOL

God bless thy lungs, good knight.

FALSTAFF

Come here, Pistol; stand behind me. O, if I had had

time to have made new liveries, I would have

bestowed the thousand pound I borrowed of you. But

'tis no matter; this poor show doth better: this

doth infer the zeal I had to see him.

SHALLOW

It doth so.

FALSTAFF

It shows my earnestness of affection,--

SHALLOW

It doth so.

FALSTAFF

My devotion,--

SHALLOW

It doth, it doth, it doth.

FALSTAFF

As it were, to ride day and night; and not to

deliberate, not to remember, not to have patience

to shift me,--

SHALLOW

It is best, certain.

FALSTAFF

But to stand stained with travel, and sweating with

desire to see him; thinking of nothing else,

putting all affairs else in oblivion, as if there

were nothing else to be done but to see him.

PISTOL

'Tis 'semper idem,' for 'obsque hoc nihil est:'

'tis all in every part.

SHALLOW

'Tis so, indeed.

PISTOL

My knight, I will inflame thy noble liver,

And make thee rage.

Thy Doll, and Helen of thy noble thoughts,

Is in base durance and contagious prison;

Haled thither

By most mechanical and dirty hand:

Rouse up revenge from ebon den with fell

Alecto's snake,

For Doll is in. Pistol speaks nought but truth.

FALSTAFF

I will deliver her.

Shouts within, and the trumpets sound

PISTOL

There roar'd the sea, and trumpet-clangor sounds.

Enter KING HENRY V and his train, the Lord Chief- Justice among them

FALSTAFF

God save thy grace, King Hal! my royal Hal!

PISTOL

The heavens thee guard and keep, most royal imp of fame!

FALSTAFF

God save thee, my sweet boy!

KING HENRY IV

My lord chief-justice, speak to that vain man.

Lord Chief-Justice Have you your wits? know you what 'tis to speak?

FALSTAFF

My king! my Jove! I speak to thee, my heart!

KING HENRY IV

I know thee not, old man: fall to thy prayers;

How ill white hairs become a fool and jester!

I have long dream'd of such a kind of man,

So surfeit-swell'd, so old and so profane;

But, being awaked, I do despise my dream.

Make less thy body hence, and more thy grace;

Leave gormandizing; know the grave doth gape

For thee thrice wider than for other men.

Reply not to me with a fool-born jest:

Presume not that I am the thing I was;

For God doth know, so shall the world perceive,

That I have turn'd away my former self;

So will I those that kept me company.

When thou dost hear I am as I have been,

Approach me, and thou shalt be as thou wast,

The tutor and the feeder of my riots:

Till then, I banish thee, on pain of death,

As I have done the rest of my misleaders,

Not to come near our person by ten mile.

For competence of life I will allow you,

That lack of means enforce you not to evil:

And, as we hear you do reform yourselves,

We will, according to your strengths and qualities,

Give you advancement. Be it your charge, my lord,

To see perform'd the tenor of our word. Set on.

Exeunt KING HENRY V, & c

FALSTAFF

Master Shallow, I owe you a thousand pound.

SHALLOW

Yea, marry, Sir John; which I beseech you to let me

have home with me.

FALSTAFF

That can hardly be, Master Shallow. Do not you

grieve at this; I shall be sent for in private to

him: look you, he must seem thus to the world:

fear not your advancements; I will be the man yet

that shall make you great.

SHALLOW

I cannot well perceive how, unless you should give

me your doublet and stuff me out with straw. I

beseech you, good Sir John, let me have five hundred

of my thousand.

FALSTAFF

Sir, I will be as good as my word: this that you

heard was but a colour.

SHALLOW

A colour that I fear you will die in, Sir John.

FALSTAFF

Fear no colours: go with me to dinner: come,

Lieutenant Pistol; come, Bardolph: I shall be sent

for soon at night.

Re-enter Prince John of LANCASTER, the Lord Chief-Justice; Officers with them

Lord Chief-Justice Go, carry Sir John Falstaff to the Fleet:

Take all his company along with him.

FALSTAFF

My lord, my lord,--

Lord Chief-Justice I cannot now speak: I will hear you soon.

Take them away.

PISTOL

Si fortune me tormenta, spero contenta.

Exeunt all but PRINCE JOHN and the Lord Chief-Justice

LANCASTER

I like this fair proceeding of the king's:

He hath intent his wonted followers

Shall all be very well provided for;

But all are banish'd till their conversations

Appear more wise and modest to the world.

Lord Chief-Justice And so they are.

LANCASTER

The king hath call'd his parliament, my lord.

Lord Chief-Justice He hath.

LANCASTER

I will lay odds that, ere this year expire,

We bear our civil swords and native fire

As far as France: I beard a bird so sing,

Whose music, to my thinking, pleased the king.

Come, will you hence?

Exeunt

EPILOGUE

Spoken by a Dancer

First my fear; then my courtesy; last my speech.

My fear is, your displeasure; my courtesy, my duty;

and my speech, to beg your pardons. If you look

for a good speech now, you undo me: for what I have

to say is of mine own making; and what indeed I

should say will, I doubt, prove mine own marring.

But to the purpose, and so to the venture. Be it

known to you, as it is very well, I was lately here

in the end of a displeasing play, to pray your

patience for it and to promise you a better. I

meant indeed to pay you with this; which, if like an

ill venture it come unluckily home, I break, and

you, my gentle creditors, lose. Here I promised you

I would be and here I commit my body to your

mercies: bate me some and I will pay you some and,

as most debtors do, promise you infinitely.

If my tongue cannot entreat you to acquit me, will

you command me to use my legs? and yet that were but

light payment, to dance out of your debt. But a

good conscience will make any possible satisfaction,

and so would I. All the gentlewomen here have

forgiven me: if the gentlemen will not, then the

gentlemen do not agree with the gentlewomen, which

was never seen before in such an assembly.

One word more, I beseech you. If you be not too

much cloyed with fat meat, our humble author will

continue the story, with Sir John in it, and make

you merry with fair Katharine of France: where, for

any thing I know, Falstaff shall die of a sweat,

unless already a' be killed with your hard

opinions; for Oldcastle died a martyr, and this is

not the man. My tongue is weary; when my legs are

too, I will bid you good night: and so kneel down

before you; but, indeed, to pray for the queen.

Table of Contents

Dramatis Personae

Induction

ACT 1

Scene 1

Scene 2

Scene 3

ACT 2

Scene 1

Scene 2

Scene 3

Scene 4

ACT 3

Scene 1

Scene 2

ACT 4

Scene 1

Scene 2

Scene 3

Scene 4

Scene 5

ACT 5

Scene 1

Scene 2

Scene 3

Scene 4

Scene 5

Epilogue